Resource May 14, 2018

Meet the Journalist: Warren Cornwall

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In Khulna, the Polder 32 area. Image by Tanmoy Bhaduri. Bangladesh, 2017.
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In the 1960s, Bangladesh walled off parts of its coast to stop flooding and create farmland. Today...

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Residents of Polder 32 on the Bangladesh coast.
Residents stand at the edge of Polder 32 on the Bangladesh coast. The polder was inundated by Cyclone Aila in 2009. The flooding lasted two years, after the walls surrounding the polder were damaged. Now the walls are being rebuilt. But some scientists warn that's inviting another disaster.

Warren Cornwall, a freelance journalist and contributing correspondent to Science magazine, traveled to Bangladesh for three weeks to investigate how the country is preparing its coastal areas to deal with climate change. Much of the country is a low-lying river delta created by three huge rivers, the Brahmaputra, the Ganges, and the Meghna. Because the area is so low and flat, it's particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels. It's also in the path of cyclones coming from the Bay of Bengal, and there are concerns that these storms, and the floods they cause, will get more intense as the climate changes.

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