Pushpo Mandal still remembers the day, nine years ago, when Cyclone Aila struck and the slender creek at the southern edge of her village swelled into a watery monster.Tall tidal waves broke through the earth embankment, rushing into homes and fields, “gulping down everything that came their way”, recalled Mandal from Patharpara village on the coast of India’s West Bengal state. Patharpara, in the Gosaba block of South 24 Parganas district, near the border with Bangladesh, was among the many Sundarbans villages devastated by the ferocious 2009 storm. Yet while the memory still haunts them, villagers have learned lessons from the destruction – planting mangroves to reinforce the embankments that protect their homes and fields from tidal surges.

Basu, M. (2018, November 28). As tides rise, Indian villagers find a friend in mangroves. Malaya Business Insight, p. B5.