Shah M. Asik Ullah

Rooftop farming is a modern way of growing food in cities that uses unused rooftop spaces to promote local food production. A lack of knowledge and limited access to technical assistance are major obstacles that hinder the practice. Furthermore, traditional agricultural extension services currently provide insufficient incentives to encourage this practice. These limitations, however, can be addressed by providing real‐time information and support through social media platforms such as Facebook. This study investigates the extent to which Facebook supports the information needs of rooftop gardeners within the framework of virtual communities of practice. It also seeks to assess the perceived usefulness of information shared in Facebook groups for enhancing the capacity of rooftop gardeners. Data were collected from 120 rooftop gardeners in Bangladesh through an online survey administered via Google Forms and distributed across two popular Facebook groups. Findings indicate that information sharing in Facebook groups assists rooftop gardeners in planning, acquiring, and utilizing resources, carrying out intercultural operations, and determining optimal harvesting and storage practices. Overall, Facebook can play a significant role in bridging the information gap among rooftop gardeners and in enhancing their skills. Moreover, it represents a valuable resource for urban dwellers interested in engaging in rooftop gardening.

The Teknaf region in Bangladesh experienced a massive Rohingya refugee influx from Myanmar in 2017, where more than a million refugees fled to Bangladesh. This influx exerted considerable pressure on the local socioeconomic structures, livelihood activities, and environmental resources. This study evaluates the refugees' impact on the agricultural dynamics in Teknaf where farming is the major livelihood means for the local community. Based on primary data from interviews with a representative sample of 98 farming households, the study elucidates shifts in agricultural practice post-influx. It was observed that while the acreage of crop cultivation contracted, enhanced agricultural methods and the introduction of modern crop varieties facilitated a rise in production. Consequently, there was a modest 4% increase in annual household income from agriculture. The cropping pattern shifted from rice dominant to vegetable based. The shift was facilitated by the available of lower waged (450-500 BDT vs 350-400 BDT daily wage) refugee laborers compared to local laborers. The employment of Rohingya laborers at wages below the local standard was prevalent, yet approximately 44% of farmers reported dissatisfaction with the laborers' productivity. The agriculture sector faced notable adversities, including diminished arable land, environmental resource depletion, inflated input costs, and a scarcity of irrigation resources, which collectively compound the challenges faced by the farming community. Addressing the challenges identified, the study advocates for the creation of targeted agricultural support programs to enhance the value addition within host communities. Additionally, fostering small-scale farming projects for the refugees and host community could be instrumental in promoting sustainable livelihoods and engendering economic resilience at the local level.

In Japan, rural areas are grappling with population decline and aging, leading to a shortage of labor for farmland maintenance. This has resulted in the abandonment of farmland or its conversion for solar photovoltaic (PV) use. However, this unplanned conversion raises concerns about agricultural productivity decline, landscape degradation, biodiversity loss, water resource maintenance, and disaster prevention. This study focuses on the Kushida watershed, examining (1) accurate farmland classification using remote sensing data, (2) the geographical distribution of farmland converted to PV systems from 2016 to 2021 and concentrated along the river, especially on north-facing slopes, (3) the highest conversion rates in wheat fields, followed by legume fields, tea fields, and paddy fields, and (4) no clear correlation between farmland conversions and changes in the number of farmers, but associations with farmland geography and solar radiation levels. These findings contribute to a nuanced understanding of sustainable rural development in Japan, emphasizing the importance of considering geographical factors in the conversion of farmland to PV.

The Rohingya refugee influx to Bangladesh in 2017 was a historical incident; the number of refugees was so massive that significant impacts to local communities was inevitable. The Bangladesh government provided land in a preserved area for constructing makeshift camps for the refugees. Previous studies have revealed the land cover changes and impacts of the refugee influx around campsites, especially with regard to local forest resources. Our aim is to establish a convenient approach of providing up-to-date information to monitor holistic local situations. We employed a classic unsupervised technique—a combination of k-means clustering and maximum likelihood estimation—with the latest rich time-series satellite images of Sentinal-1 and Sentinal-2. A combination of VV and normalized difference water index (NDWI) images was successful in identifying built-up/disturbed areas, and a combination of VH and NDWI images was successful in differentiating wetland/saltpan, agriculture /open field, degraded forest/bush, and forest areas. By doing this, we provided annual land cover classification maps for the entire Teknaf peninsula for the pre- and post-influx periods with both fair quality and without prior training data. Our analyses revealed that on-going impacts were still observed by May 2021. As a simple estimation of the intervention consequence, the built-up/disturbed areas increased 6825 ha (compared with the 2015–17 period). However, while the impacts on the original forest were not found to be significant, the degraded forest/bush areas were largely degraded by 4606 ha. These cultivated lands would be used for agricultural activities. This is in line with the reported farmers’ increased income, despite local people with other occupations that are all equally facing the decreases in income. The convenience of our unsupervised classification approach would help keep accumulating a time-series land cover classification, which is important in monitoring impacts on local communities.

The refugee influx from Myanmar, known as Rohingya refugees, is a serious concern for global refugee issues. Bangladesh currently hosts one million Rohingya refugees in the coastal district of Cox’s Bazar. Considering the number of the refugees, in addition to the humanitarian concerns, they are also creating pressure on the local host communities. This study explored the socioeconomic changes of the host communities after the refugee influx. In order to fulfill this study’s objectives, 35 villages near the Rohingya refugee camps from the coastal district of Bangladesh were surveyed. In the villages, 10% of households were surveyed in 2016 and also in 2020, covering 1924 and 2265 households, respectively. A temporal comparison of the host community’s socioeconomic status between 2016 and 2020 was conducted in order to determine the changes after the recent refugee influx. This study found that the local community’s socioeconomic status degraded. The annual income decreased by 24%, which is unusual for a country with over 6% gross domestic product (GDP) growth in recent times. The income decreased from all livelihood options except farming, which could be related to the availability of cheap labor and the high demand for commodities. The villages were clustered using k-means, and 20 villages were found to be affected after the refugee influx with degraded socioeconomic status. The host community’s general perception was initially positive, but later turned negative toward the refugees. This study will be important for the government and donor agencies to develop strategies to properly manage the refugee camps and adjacent host communities.

Sustainable development requires better understanding of the human-landscape relationship in forested landscapes, one that facilitates more locally relevant and sustainable management. It can be more easily understood by the process of landscape characterisation and humans’ valuation. Therefore, this study assesses local people’s preferences and perceptions about the physical landscape, which is crucial for managing landscape and livelihood. The study investigates the diversification of landscape character types and landscape character areas (LCA), local people’s perceptions about and preferences for different LCAs, and how and why they prefer some LCAs to others. An LCA is a distinct type of landscape that is relatively homogenous in character. Two different villages located in Teknaf peninsula, Bangladesh, are examined where the villages were selected by calculating vegetation cover within a buffer of 1 kilometre. Landform and vegetation data were collected as physical characteristics of the landscape to identify the LCA, and data for local people’s perception and preferences were collected through focus group discussions and questionnaire surveys by selecting 10% of the households of each village in March 2016. The findings show that in Kerantali the diversification of landscape character types was more than in Tulatali. Homestead garden areas are highly preferred in Tulatali and forest is highly preferred in Kerantali. Kerantali's people receive poor material benefit from forest areas, whereas Tulatoli's people receive more material benefit from homestead garden areas. Furthermore, our findings indicate that homestead gardens play an important role as a supplement to forests.