Future Melting Away: Water Stress As A Threat To Human Security In Bangladesh And The Role Of International Community

Abstract

Bangladesh is considered as one of the frontline states in the global climate change; its policy agendas attempt to respond to the perceived security threats emanating from such changes. Water stress is one of the key problems the country is facing. Yet, links between glaciers in the Hindu Kush Himalaya, Bangladesh’s climate, growing water stress, and its implications for human security have seldom been studied. Drawing on the concepts of climate change, human security and water stress, the thesis examines the causes of Bangladesh’s freshwater crisis and its contribution to the human insecurity. Here in this study, the influence of water stress on human security has been explored. Notably how salinity intrusion and arsenic water contamination turned into a human security threat. Moreover, the study elaborates that indifference to human security threat may cause vulnerability, in this case, freshwater crisis for people in Bangladesh. In the long run, such vulnerability can turn into double vulnerability and here the rural women in Bangladesh are one of the core victims. Additionally, the thesis insists that there is a contradiction between the core values of the UNICEF and its actions in mitigating water stress in Bangladesh.