Floods are a fact of life in Bangladesh. If you�ve ever seen the country on TV, it�s almost certain that you�ve seen people wading waist-deep through water. Floods themselves are not the problem, though. Some flooding is essential to water the country�s main crops: rice and jute. (Jute provides the fibre used to make carpets and sacking.)
Problems occur when there is unusually high rainfall, or when the rivers become exceptionally full, leading to extra-high flood levels.
Surviving the floods depends on having early-warning systems, on building houses on stilts, above high-water level, and on having flood shelters (which are raised platforms made of earth).
