Moso bamboo grove in Kavre. Photo: Sailesh RC via Nepali Times. Used with permission.

This article by Pinki Sris Rana was originally published in Nepali Times, and an edited version has been republished on Global Voices as part of a content-sharing agreement.

Nepal’s diverse culture uses the bamboo plant for birth, death and all rituals in between. The versatile plant is also used for construction, to make musical instruments, to carry things, to write with, even to eat.

Now, bamboo groves are being used to protect villages near Chitwan National Park in the South of Nepal that are prone to frequent flooding due to the climate crisis.

The region is filled with small streams that are dry in winter, which then overflow and become destructive during the monsoon season. To combat this, farmers in the village of Madi are planting bamboo forests along the banks of streams that block floods and stop soil erosion.

“Once the rainy season starts, we are afraid to close our eyes at night,” says Shanti Chapai, 58, who lives near the Patare Khola stream that burst its banks last year.

Google Earth images show the greening of the floodplain of the Patare Khola over 15 years. Photos courtesy: ABARI via Nepali Times.

On a recent visit, the Patare Khola was just a small stream. It is hard to imagine that it would become a raging river during the rainy season, bursting its banks and threatening farms and settlements.

While bamboo is regularly used for fencing and furniture and is an important cash crop, farmers here were initially opposed to the idea of using it for flood control. They thought bamboo was an invasive species that would suck up all the groundwater.

But for the past 15 years, the architects at ABARI (Adobe and Bamboo Research Institute) have been experimenting with thorny bamboo species like Bambusa bluemeana and Bambusa balcooa as options for restoring degraded land and controlling floods. The area is now a dense bamboo grove greening the floodplain of the Patare Khola.

A thorny bamboo species planted in Madi. Photos: Pinki Sris rana via Nepali Times. Used with permission.

Sediment from last year's monsoon floods (June–October 2024) is deposited at the foot of the bamboo trees, proving that the plants stabilized the banks and protected the surroundings by reducing the velocity of flood waters.

Madi’s villagers are now convinced that this is an effective bioengineering solution to floods. Bamboo is also fast-growing and is ideal for reclaiming eroded riverbanks. Nepal has over 50 species of bamboo, most of which are found in the wetter eastern plains and foothills. However, some species grow at altitudes of up to 4,000 meters.

“Bamboo is a misunderstood plant in our culture because it is used for funeral rites and has a negative connotation,” says Nripal Adhikary ABARI, which builds bamboo and rammed earth buildings in Nepal. “It took a while to convince locals of its benefits.”

Monsoons in Nepal have always been synonymous with disasters, but extreme weather events caused by the climate crisis have made landslides and floods worse. Poor construction of roads, unregulated quarrying of sensitive watersheds, and encroachment along floodplains increase the risk.

Porcupine structured embankments provide protection in flood-prone areas. Photos: Pinki Sris rana via Nepali Times. Used with permission.

But here in Madi, villagers have seen with their own eyes the direct benefit of bamboo for flood protection.

Farmer Phadendra Bhattarai says:

Even though there was heavy rainfall, the extent of flood damage this monsoon was considerably less. The bamboo acted as a barrier and did not let the floods destroy our crops.

This tried and tested bamboo plantation can be replicated and upscaled across Nepal, and farmers in Kanchanpur in the western plains have also planted bamboo, napier, and elephant grass along the banks of a river that unleashed destructive floods in 2018.

Floods in September 2024 in central Nepal killed 224 people, with southern Lalitpur and Kavre being hardest hit. The Rosi Valley in Kavre was devastated, and settlements swept away entire slopes. However, an area in the vicinity with a bamboo plantation remained intact (pictured below).

Photo: Sailesh RC via Nepali Times

The Dhaneshwor Baikiwa Community Forest in Kavre is a half-hectare plot of bamboo planted by the government in a pilot project in 2007 to study and research the moso bamboo (Phyllostachys pubescens). It has been 17 years and the Ministry of Forests and Environment’s Forest Research and Training Center had entirely forgotten about the project.

“Although no research has not been done here specifically in the plot, it is precisely this bamboo forest that saved villages down the mountains from major destruction,” says Badri Adhikari, custodian of the Community Forest. “Their expansive and entangled roots hold the soil firmly, protecting the slope’s stability.”

This plot may have been overlooked, but its positive effects have not. All 12 districts of Lumbini province have initiated a bamboo plantation campaign to prevent erosion and flooding.

Besides its newfound protection from flooding, bamboo also has many other uses. Traditionally, bamboo is believed to control landslides, and it is not uncommon to see villagers along the mountains reviving depleted bamboo groves once they see its benefits. Badri Adhikari says:

The bamboo tree grows upwards in height during the summer and its roots expand in the winter. So, winter is the right time to prepare for the next monsoon of damaging floods.