Extreme heat in Dhaka: plans, cycles and who is at work

One of the world’s densest cities, where heat costs workdays and fills tin-roofed homes. Heat plan: parts in place, no full plan found.

Heat type: Mostly humid heat. Dry heat and humid heat, explained.

Heat action plan: Parts in place, no full plan found

Dhaka North City Corporation appointed Asia’s first Chief Heat Officer in 2023. No city heat action plan found yet.

Sources: Arsht-Rock Resilience Center, 2023

Heat today

Live readings and the week’s forecast are on the interactive map. Official warnings: Bangladesh Meteorological Department. How much climate change shaped today’s heat: Climate Shift Index map, Climate Central.

Vicious cycles the evidence ties to Dhaka

The poverty–heat trap

Heat-related illness cost Bangladesh 250 million workdays in 2024, worth up to US$1.78 billion. Source: World Bank, 2025

People who can’t afford to stop working fall ill. Illness costs income, and lost income makes stopping even less affordable. Follow it on the map.

The energy-poverty trap

Tin-roofed informal settlements trap heat for people who can’t afford to cool.

People who can’t afford to cool fall ill. Illness brings debt, and debt puts cooling even further out of reach. Follow it on the map.

The displacement loop

Migrants land in settlements on the edges of the city, often in heat-trapping housing.

People forced to move often land in heat-trapping housing, fall ill, lose income, fall further behind, and are forced to move again. Follow it on the map.

The lost-schooling loop

Bangladesh closed schools for about 33 million children in its April 2024 heatwave. Source: NBC News, 2024

Children pulled out of school earn less as adults, and poorer families pull more children out of school. Follow it on the map.

Recently updated here

• Bangladesh’s first urban heatwave action plan, for Narayanganj (added in the October 2026 update)

Every change is checked before it appears. What changed this month · Corrections

Who heat hits hardest here

• Workers in heat-exposed jobs
• People in informal settlements

A worked plan to learn from

Dhaka acts before the heat peaks (Dhaka, Bangladesh, 2023 onwards)

Already at work here

• Dhaka North City Corporation: Appointed Asia’s first Chief Heat Officer in 2023, focused on cooling the poorest neighbourhoods.
• Bangladesh Red Crescent Society: Runs an early action protocol for heat, first activated in April 2024 during Dhaka’s longest recorded heatwave.
• icddr,b: Works with Bangladesh’s Department of Agricultural Extension and others on HeatShield, which helps farmers cope with extreme heat.
• BRAC: In Bangladesh’s April 2024 heat emergency, mobilised 50,000 community health workers to raise awareness, with a focus on families with pregnant women, and is piloting heat-reduction ideas in urban informal settlements.
• Practical Action: Connects heat risk intelligence, local action, practical technology, institutions and finance, following a Sense → Decide → Act → Sustain logic. In Nepal, Dhangadhi’s heat action plan links temperature, humidity and health data, hotspot mapping and community views to thresholds and set municipal responses. In Bangladesh, heat is being built into early warning and livelihood work. A partner in the Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance.
• Bangladesh Bank: Steers credit to farmers after climate shocks through its refinancing schemes. In June 2026 it told banks to prioritise farmers hit by heavy rain. Heat is not yet among the shocks that trigger this support.

Listing does not imply partnership, affiliation or endorsement.

The national picture

Plans and law, warnings, rules for heat at work, cooling, money and other cities in Bangladesh: the Bangladesh country snapshot.