NEWS HIGHLIGHTS
Theme : Environmental Pollution & Degradation
Paper : GS - 3
Over the past few decades, the mangrove forest cover in Sundarbans has been rapidly diminishing, alarming environmentalists and policymakers alike. Thus, a joint collaboration between India and Bangladesh to conserve Sundarban is imperative.
The Sundarbans hosts the largest mangrove forests in the world, lying on the delta of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers on the Bay of Bengal.Mangrove ecosystem is a very specialized environment occurring in between the land and the sea in the tropical and subtropical regions
TABLE OF CONTENT
- Context
- Sundarbans
- Issues faced by Sundarbans
- Causes of Decline of Sunderbans
- Road Ahead
Context :
Over the past few decades, the mangrove forest cover in Sundarbans has been rapidly diminishing, alarming environmentalists and policymakers alike. Thus, a joint collaboration between India and Bangladesh to conserve Sundarban is imperative.
Sundarbans :
- The Sundarbans hosts the largest mangrove forests in the world, lying on the delta of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers on the Bay of Bengal.Mangrove ecosystem is a very specialized environment occurring in between the land and the sea in the tropical and subtropical regions.
- Sundarban is the natural abode of many groups of animals and a large number of species are known to feed, breed and take shelter in this ecosystem.It is home to many rare and globally threatened wildlife species such as the estuarine crocodile, water monitor lizard, Gangetic dolphin and olive ridley turtle.
- 40% of Sundarban lies in India and the rest in Bangladesh. Sundarban was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987 (India) and 1997 (Bangladesh).
Issues faced by Sundarbans :
- Sea Level Rise: Sundarbans faces nearly double the sea level rise compared to other coastal regions.
- Also, increasing frequency and intensity of cyclones in this region poses a serious threat to its carbon sequestration potential and other ecosystem services of this mangrove forest.
- Rising Salinity of Water: With frequent storms over the years, the salinity of water of most of the rivers and ponds has increased in almost all areas of the Sundarbans.
- The rising salinity is reducing the productivity of fishponds and farmland, resulting in even lower incomes for poor and vulnerable households.
- Extreme Poverty: The high degree of climate vulnerability contributes to extreme poverty in this region. It has a high population density of 980 persons/sq km on the Indian side and between 370-850 persons/sq km on the Bangladesh side.
- Moreover, the average income is less than USD 1 per day. People also suffer from poor infrastructure.
- Lack of Bilateral Collaboration: Though India and Bangladesh formed a bilateral Joint Working Group (JWG) on the Conservation of Sundarbans but it has met only once, in July 2016, thus making little or no progress.
- The two countries’ institutions at the national and sub-national levels are not integrated to address these issues.
- Threat to Wildlife: Loss of these mangrove habitats due to climate change is also leading to loss of species that belong to IUCN’s near-threatened or endangered category.
- These settlement mangroves used to be safe havens of diverse molluscs and crustaceans, but these are also disappearing due to the polluted discharges and breeding activities of these species.
Causes of Decline of Sunderbans :
- The increased population with few alternative livelihood opportunities poses a serious threat to the Sundarbans as it is the main cause of mangrove destruction.
- Excessive exploitation and negligence of restocking are the main cause of Overall depletion of growing stocks of Sundarbans forest.
- A team of researchers surveyed 19 shoreline mangrove patches, collected soil and water samples and studied them.
- The results published highlight that lack of essential nutrients and increasing salinity were the main problems in Sunderbans.
- “Nutrient depletion, especially phosphorus and nitrogen were found to be directly connected with the decline in forest cover.
- They are now trying to understand what is causing nutrient depletion.
- They also planned to expand this analysis to a larger area, so as to cover the whole mangrove region and get a complete picture.
Road Ahead :
- A new technology developed by Indian scientists for ecological restoration is helping in revival of mangroves degraded due to rising sea levels, climate change and human intrusion in the Sunderbans in West Bengal.
- The restoration technology involves plantation of native salt-tolerant grasses and a diverse set of carefully identified mangrove species in different zones of degraded mangrove patches. It also involves the use of growth-promoting bacteria.