Dr. is Assistant Professor in the School of Gender, Sexuality and Women鈥檚 Studies at 91亚色. A member of Bigstone Cree Nation in Treaty 8 territory, her research focuses on the political economy of oil and gas in Alberta. She is a co-investigator on the SSHRC-funded (Partnership Grant) Corporate Mapping Project, where she completed research with the Parkland Institute on Indigenous experiences in Alberta鈥檚 oil industry and its gendered impact on working families. Angele is also a member of the Just Powers research team, a SSHRC-funded Insight Grant, enabling her to produce a documentary called Pikopaywin: It is Broken. Featuring stories on the land, Indigenous traditional land users, environmental officers, and elders bear witness to the impact that the fossil fuel industry, forestry and climate change has on traditional Treaty 8 territory. With Dr. Deborah McGregor, Osgoode Hall Law School and Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change (EUC), Angele is co-investigator on the project, funded by 91亚色.聽

鈥淭he ways that bureaucracy deals with Indigenous peoples is to assign a group of experts to talk to us and the rest simply continue as they always have,鈥� observes Professor Alook. Government, often working hand in hand with corporations, together speak to Indigenous peoples. 鈥淏ut they do not consult us,鈥� continues Professor Alook, 鈥淣or do they respect their treaties with us.鈥� In the words of community Elders, the consequence is that the land that makes up Treaty 8 territory is now broken, devastated by oil and gas wells and the infrastructure that supports them.

In the film produced by Professor Alook, Pikopaywin: It is Broken, she speaks to Elders from her community who bear witness to the devastation that the oil industry has wrought. 鈥淲e care for the water. We care for the land. Because it is our diet, it is our livelihood,鈥� emphasizes Elder Albert Yellowkneee. Since the oil industry has destroyed much of the land that gives life and livelihood, Yellowknee fears that he is the last generation to experience the land in this way: 鈥淲hat about my children, my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren? Will they have a place to go out into the woods and meditate? Like we do?鈥� For Professor Alook, such conversations were difficult: 鈥淓lder Albert brought me and the film crew close to tears. Because he has a trapline, which has been in his family for many generations, and it has been literally cut down, destroyed, by the oil and forestry industry. He is no longer able to offer traditional, land-based teachings in the same way. We are no longer able to practice our treaty rights.鈥�

To create a future for the children of Bigstone Cree Nation in Treaty 8 territory means challenging the government, for its failure to respect treaty rights. This demands confrontation with corporations, who fail to consult with the Bigstone Cree Nation in Treaty 8 territory, much less respect Indigenous self-determination. If this is a very unequal struggle, it is a vitally necessary one. As Elder Verna Orr observes, 鈥淚f we have no trees, there is no life out there.鈥� And she continues, 鈥淢y hope is for people to stand together, pray together and be strong. And hopefully, the government and the oil companies will stop taking our trees.鈥� 

Pikopaywin: It is Broken is available through the website.

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Dr. Byomkesh Talukder is the inaugural Planetary Health Fellow at the Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research, where he works at the intersection of health, sustainable development, climate change and food and agriculture systems. He is currently project co-director in four research projects: (1) Mapping Canada鈥檚 Imported Food Supply Chains to Identify Climate Change-Related Health Risks, (2) Ecological Footprint Health Indicators, (3) Complex Adaptive Modelling of Health Impacts of Climate Change in Malawi & Paraguay, and (4) Climate Change, Salinity & Public Health in Bangladesh. His past research applies a complexity science approach to designing sustainability assessment models of food and agricultural systems in Bangladesh. Dr. Talukder also has over 15 years of interdisciplinary field and training experience, including supervising more than 2,000 emerging leaders in sustainable development programs and policy design in Bangladesh. Since 2016, he has been a Mitacs Postdoctoral Fellow at Parmalat Canada and the Desautels Faculty of Management, McGill University. Dr. Talukdar holds a PhD in Geography and Environmental Studies (Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada), a MES in Environmental Studies (Queen鈥檚 University, Canada), a MSc in Development Science (Hiroshima University, Japan), and a MSc in Geography and Environment (Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh).

By Elaine Coburn, Director of the Centre for Feminist Research

In his seminar, 鈥淐limate Change, Sea Level Rise, and Community Planetary Health in Bangladesh鈥�, Dr. Talukder observed that if traditional medicine is concerned with health within the human body, planetary systems are concerned with external systems, including the climate, that affect people鈥檚 health. This enables a more holistic, non-linear approach to understanding complex issues, including rising salinity associated with rising seas in Bangladesh due to climate change.聽

Today, the coastal areas of Bangladesh are home to more than 40 million people. It is estimated that by 2050 about 27 million people will be immediately affected by climate change, including heavily populated areas along coastal rivers. If sea levels rise by just 1.5 metres, more than 80% of people in Bangladesh will be affected since the vast majority of the population lives in a flood plain. In addition, frequent cyclones originate in the Bay of Bengal. Annually, they bring water, now heavily salinated because of rising seas, that kills all vegetation, rendering previously fertile lands barren. Combined with more than 290 dams in India and more than 100 dams in China, which aggravate penuries of water during the dry season, and Himalayan ice melt due to climate change, Bangladesh suffers from significant water shortages and increased salinity. Not only water but soil is becoming increasingly saline.

Development projects along rivers in Bangladesh, including dams, have not worked well but create waterlogging that makes agriculture impossible. In response to changing conditions, farmers have shifted agriculture to saline-water crops, like shrimp, moving away from previous staple crops like rice. If shrimp farming has created economic benefits, the decreased agricultural diversity 鈥� in dramatic decline from the 1970s to about 2014 鈥� because of the concentration on the monoculture of shrimp, has created attendant health problems, due to food insecurity and diminished biodiversity. Shrimp feed has aggravated problems by interfering with the natural ecosystems. As mangrove forests decline, water is no longer retained by trees, making communities more vulnerable to the devastating effects of floods.聽

Primary negative health impacts include the scarcity of freshwater. This is especially burdensome for women who must travel 5 to 10 km to search out fresh water. Many communities are using rainwater or open pond water for their daily household water needs. This creates communicable diseases, including skin infections, cholera, diarrhea, dysentery and ocular diseases. Hypertension increases due to salt in water and in food systems.聽

Secondary negative health impacts include high rates of miscarriage among women who live close to coastal areas. Women stand in saline water for many hours a day, creating problems for women鈥檚 reproductive health, an under-investigated health concern observed by many local community groups. A lack of a diversified food given the concentration in the shrimp, creates vitamin D deficiencies, including rickets.聽

Tertiary negative health impacts include the increase in breast and ovarian cancers in women. Women are harvesting drinking water in plastic containers and since plastics are unregulated, some are contaminated, which may be the cause of the increase in these cancers among women. There is increased mental health stress, especially among women, given the long distances they must travel to obtain basic needs, like water for the households. Internal migration often means a concentration of formerly rural people in urban slums, creating attendant health problems given the conditions in these slums which have weak sanitation systems.聽

Overall, health inequities are increasing, especially in coastal areas.

Resolving these health impacts demands complex solutions from multiple stakeholders, everything from weather predictor systems to public health expertise. We need to listen to different stakeholders and the connections among the different challenges that they face to develop complex models that can help us understand the links among climate change, extreme weather events, internal migration and conflicts and public health, all of which are, in addition, gendered. This means taking into account biodiversity, vector-borne disease and the causal relationships among these different factors to create data beyond current tendencies to work in silos. Dynamic modelling is required if we are to develop scenarios, forecasting and support local communities and other stakeholders in developing community-based interventions to salinity and to enable monitoring to understand the present and better predict future health impacts. 

But modeling is not enough. We need interventions that take into account complex systems to support the government of Bangladesh鈥檚 100-year delta plan, as the state seeks to ensure the sustainability of ecosystems for better livelihoods and intergenerational health in Bangladesh. We must prepare for different futures, knowing that if we do not take action now on climate change we will not be able to adapt to climate change in the future. We need to adapt today and we need to do this for many reasons, including for the health of people like those living in coastal areas of Bangladesh who are already being affected in their everyday life by climate change, especially rising sea levels and increasing salinity of coastal waters.聽

Related Work

Talukder, B., Ganguli, N. & VanLoon, G. W., (2022). Climate Change Related Foodborne Zoonotic Diseases and Pathogens Modelling. The Journal of Climate Change and Health, 100111.

Talukder, B., Ganguli, N., Matthew, R., VanLoon, G. W., Hipel, K. W., & Orbinski, J. (2022). Climate Change-Accelerated Ocean Biodiversity Loss & Associated Planetary Health Impacts. The Journal of Climate Change and Health, 100114

Matthew, R., Chiotha, S., Orbinski, J. & Talukder, B. (2021). Research note: Climate change, peri-urban space and emerging infectious disease. Landscape and Urban Planning, 218, 104298.

Talukder, B., Ganguli, N., Matthew, R., VanLoon, G. W., Hipel, K. W., & Orbinski, J. (2021). Climate change鈥恡riggered land degradation and planetary health: A review. Land Degradation & Development 32 (16), 4509-4522.

Talukder, B., vanLoon, G. W., Hipel, K. W., Chiotha, S. & Orbinski, J. (2021). Health Impacts of Climate Change on Smallholder Farmers. One Health, 100258.

Talukder, B., Matthew, R., Bunch, J. M., vanLoon, G. W., Hipel, K. W. & Orbinski, J. (2021). Melting of Himalayan Glaciers and Planetary Health. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, 50, 98-108.

Talukder, B., van Loon, G., Hipel, K. W., & Orbinski, J. (2021). COVID-19's Implications on Agri-food Systems and Human Health in Bangladesh. Current Research in Environmental Sustainability, 100033.

Talukder, B., Blay-Palmer, A., & Hipel, K. W. (2020). Towards Complexity of Agricultural Sustainability Assessment: Main Issues and Concerns. Environmental and Sustainability Indicators, 100038.

Talukder, B., & Hipel, K. W. (2019). Diagnosis of Sustainability of Trans-Boundary Water Governance in the Great Lakes Basin. World Development, 129, 1-12.

Talukder, B., vanLoon, G. W., & Hipel, K. W. (2018). Energy Efficiency of Agricultural Systems in the Southwest Coastal Zone of Bangladesh. Ecological Indicators, 98, 641-648.

Talukder, B., Hipel, K. W., & vanLoon, G. W. (2017). Developing Composite Indicators for Agricultural Sustainability Assessment: Effect of Normalization and Aggregation Techniques. Resources, 6(4), 66.

Talukder, B., Saifuzzaman, M., & vanLoon, G. W. (2016). Sustainability of Changing Agricultural Systems in the Coastal Zone of Bangladesh. Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems, 31(2) 148-165.

Talukder, B., Nakagoshi, N., & Shahedur, R. M. (2009). State and Management of Wetlands in Bangladesh. Landscape and Ecological Engineering, 5(1), 81-90.

The post Preparing for Healthy Futures in Bangladesh in a World of Climate Change appeared first on Research & Innovation.

is a podcast about academic research and why it matters. Join podcast host (professor of Accounting at Schulich School of Business) for a special 10-part series featuring extraordinary researchers and creators at 91亚色 and their innovative methodologies and approaches. A new episode is launched every month.

Podcast or Perish is supported by 91亚色鈥檚 Office of the Vice-President Research & Innovation in partnership with Schulich School of Business.

Episodes:

, of 91亚色鈥檚 Osgoode Hall Law School, holds a Canada Research Chair in Environmental Law & Justice. Her work examines the problematic jurisdictional reality that shapes the transition to a green economy, as Canadian mining companies seek to develop resources on land belonging to the First Nations.

 of 91亚色 studies motherhood from a profoundly feminist perspective. Deconstructing the taken-for-granted, culturally normative image of mothers has led her to publish over 20 books on mothering. Her most recent work explores the inordinate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mothers.

, of the Faculty of Education at 91亚色, studies the impact that the core beliefs and values of teachers have on classroom practice. She talks here about the emotional experience of online learning and how this has affected teachers and students during the pandemic.

, Chair of the Department of Dance at 91亚色, is an award-winning filmmaker whose documentaries capture the beauty of motion and the dreams of possibility among dancers in the Philippines. His work is gorgeous and human, with carefully framed images and haunting, evocative soundtracks.

, Canada Research Chair in Supply Chain Management at the Schulich School of Business, is a leading expert on the subject of supply chain disruptions. His research on quality management, mass customization, and supply chain relationships has helped supply managers and public policymakers minimize disruptions.

, of the School of Health Policy & Management in the Faculty of Health, studies the emotional, psychological, and contextual factors that shape how healthcare workers do their jobs. Her research has helped thousands of oncologists and neurosurgeons understand how they process grief and how their emotional connection to patients influences life-or-death decisions that they face every day.

, James and Joanne Love Chair in Environmental Engineering at Lassonde School of Engineering, studies emerging contaminants in wastewater. She creates the techniques to identify new pollutants such as pharmaceutical compounds that are hazardous at extremely low concentrations, and then eliminate them in ways that contribute positively to the ecosystem.

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