From backyard gardens to global pledges: What tripled adaptation finance could mean for Bangladesh
As Bangladesh scales up local resilience – from drought-resistant farming to mangrove restoration – global pledge to triple adaptation finance could shape how far those efforts reach
Shushila Chorai did not expect vegetables to change her routine.
For years, work in her Santal village in Naogaon was uncertain. Only a handful of families owned land. During the mango season, some found temporary jobs. Outside that window, most women stayed idle or took on irregular work – cutting grass, tending cattle, waiting for opportunity.
"Very few of us have our own land," Shushila said. "Some seasons we work, some seasons we just wait."
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Now, beside her house, rows of vegetables grow where dry soil once cracked under the sun. What began as small training sessions on drought-resistant seed farming has quietly altered daily life in the village.
Women who rarely participated in formal agriculture are now cultivating backyard plots thanks to drought resistant seeds using mulching sheets to conserve moisture and simple pest traps to protect crops.
The change is visible not only in income, but in confidence.
In drought-prone Sapahar upazila, climate adaptation has taken the form of small but steady interventions – a lined pond to store water, stress-tolerant seeds, backyard farming techniques, and drought-resistant crop varieties developed by the government's agricultural research wing.
Together, these measures are gradually reshaping how communities cope with erratic rainfall driven by climate change.
Across Bangladesh, similar efforts are unfolding in coastal villages, river erosion belts and flood-prone districts. As climate risks intensify, adaptation is no longer optional but existential. From saline-resistant crops to stronger cyclone preparedness systems, adaptation on the country's climate front lines has become a means of survival.
And this year, for the first time, global climate negotiations at COP30 in Brazil had signalled that such local efforts may soon receive greater international backing.
At the COP30 climate summit in Belem, adaptation moved closer to the centre of global climate politics. Countries agreed to triple adaptation finance by 2035 – a political signal that resilience, long overshadowed by mitigation debates, is now receiving stronger attention.
For vulnerable nations such as Bangladesh – where rising seas, salinity intrusion, river erosion and heatwaves are not distant threats but lived realities – the commitment marks an important shift.
Daniel Porcel, a climate policy expert at the Talanoa Institute, said the pledge marks an important step, though key technical details are still being clarified within the UN process.
"There is currently a political dispute around how the established target will be interpreted," he said, adding that it will depend on further discussions within the UNFCCC process.
The most ambitious interpretation would use roughly $40 billion in annual adaptation finance as the baseline, Porcel said, implying around $120 billion by 2035. Further clarification is expected as discussions continue within the UN climate process.
For Bangladesh, the broader direction of travel matters – whether international finance can expand at a pace that matches accelerating climate impacts.
"We managed to retain the 'triple' language," said Mirza Shawkat Ali, director of Climate Change and International Convention at the Department of Environment, noting that questions remain over the precise baseline from which the increase will be calculated. "Now the focus will be on how the commitment is operationalised."
Mirza said Bangladesh has steadily expanded its adaptation portfolio over the past decade, combining engineered infrastructure with community-based solutions.
The government has strengthened coastal embankments, constructed cyclone and flood shelters, improved early warning systems, and expanded drought-, flood- and saline-tolerant crop varieties through public research institutions. Canal re-excavation, drainage upgrades and climate-resilient housing projects are also underway in vulnerable riverine and coastal areas.
He noted that Bangladesh has mobilised roughly $490 million domestically through its Climate Change Trust Fund over roughly the past decade, alongside broader climate allocations in national development budgets.
By comparison, the country has received about $277 million in grants and $250 million in concessional loans from international climate funds combined.
"We are investing significant domestic resources, and this effort must be scaled up," Mirza said, underscoring the pivotal role that stronger international support could play.
In coastal Pirojpur, adaptation looks different.
When Cyclone Remal struck, volunteers moved door to door along the Baleshwar and Kochar rivers, urging families to seek shelter. Loudspeakers crackled through villages as storm clouds gathered. More than 800,000 people were evacuated before landfall.
Elderly Jamina Khatun made it to a cyclone centre near her home but lost consciousness on the way after being injured in the rush.
"I don't know what happened afterwards," she said later, standing where her tin-shed house once stood. "When the water receded, everything was gone."
Bangladesh's long-term investment in early warning systems, cyclone shelters and volunteer networks has dramatically reduced fatalities from major storms. The country has more than 5,000 cyclone shelters, and over 76,000 volunteers – nearly half of them women – work along the coast under the Cyclone Preparedness Programme (CPP), an early warning system credited with saving thousands of lives.
But survival during the storm does not automatically translate into recovery. Embankments must be rebuilt. Livelihoods restored. Freshwater systems repaired.
Adaptation here is not abstract policy. It is the margin between evacuation and tragedy.
Bangladesh has mobilised substantial domestic resources for adaptation. Over the past decade, the country has funded climate resilience projects through national budgets and its Climate Change Trust Fund, supporting embankment reinforcement, climate-resilient housing, stress-tolerant crops etc.
Bangladesh's National Adaptation Plan estimates adaptation needs of around $8.5 billion per year through mid-century.
International contributions remain limited relative to those requirements.
Zakir Hossain Khan, executive director of Change Initiative, said Bangladesh has received only about 1% of its required adaptation finance and 2.35% of mitigation funding from foreign sources under its second Nationally Determined Contribution.
This imbalance, he argued, reflects a global system still tilted toward loans rather than grants – adding financial strain to already vulnerable economies.
Mirza acknowledged the limits of negotiations.
"International climate finance is difficult to secure, and the amounts are small compared to our needs," he said. "We must primarily help ourselves, while making the most of whatever support comes."
If the COP30 pledge materialises at ambition, it could accelerate projects that are already underway – easing pressure on a national budget currently strained by economic challenges, as Bangladesh seeks a deferral of its graduation from Least Developed Country (LDC) status to retain associated trade benefits for a few more years.
In Satkhira's coastal belt, adaptation has taken root in another form.
Widowed day labourer Maryam Begum remembers Cyclone Amphan in 2020, when embankments collapsed and salty water submerged her home for months.
"I lost everything," she said. "Every cyclone claimed something from me. Amphan claimed it all."
A year later, she stood along the same riverbank – this time planting mangrove saplings.
Through a community-led programme run by the NGO Friendship, residents began raising mangrove seedlings and planting them along vulnerable embankments. The restored belts now stretch across more than 60 kilometres, protecting over 120,000 people.
"Since we planted the mangroves, our river embankment hasn't been breached," Maryam said.
These green buffers complement engineered infrastructure, absorbing storm surges and reducing erosion. They are evidence that adaptation, when resourced and community-driven, can strengthen resilience in measurable ways.
For climate advocates, the COP30 pledge must translate into grant-based public finance if it is to make a transformative difference.
"As a global bellwether of climate vulnerability, Bangladesh already spends nearly 10% of its national budget on resilience – effectively taxing its own development to pay for a crisis it did not create," said Harjeet Singh, founding director of Satat Sampada.
"For vulnerable communities, adaptation is the thin line between a home and a graveyard."
If scaled effectively, tripled adaptation finance could expand drought-resistant agriculture in regions like Naogaon, salt-resident agriculture in the coastal districts, reinforce embankments in cyclone-prone districts, strengthen riverbank protection in inland erosion belts and accelerate climate-resilient housing for displaced families.
Bangladesh already has tested models. What determines their future reach is not conceptual clarity, but financial scale.
Back in Naogaon, the redesigned village pond now holds nearly 1.7 million litres of water – deep enough to sustain crops through the dry months. Under mango trees, turmeric grows alongside vegetables.
Women who once struggled to find seasonal work now tend backyard gardens year-round – a quiet reflection of how Bangladesh is already adapting, locally and persistently. The global pledge to triple adaptation finance signals that the world is beginning to recognise the urgency of that effort.
A short walk away, teenage student Jhyoti Murmu stands by the village pond, was tending to her bottle gourd patch.
"If the water stays, we can grow food. If we can grow food, we don't have to worry so much," Jhyoti said, adjusting the vines of her bottle gourd patch.
This story was produced with the support of the Brazilian Association of Investigative Journalism (Abraji) in partnership with the Talanoa Institute.
