Dhaka, May 22 – At least 140 rivers in the country are gasping for survival, of them, 13 rivers are on their way to extinction. Besides, 120 species of local fish have become extinct and 45 species are on the category of danger level now, experts said Tuesday.The Poribesh Bachao Andolan (POBA), a platform for the green activists organized a round-table discussion to mark the ‘International Biodiversity Day 2018’ held its city office at Kalabagan on Tuesday. The theme of the Day is ‘Celebrating 25 Years of Action for Biodiversity’.
Among others, chairman of POBA Abu Naser Khan, former executive engineer of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport authority (BIWTA) Tofael Ahmed, Nirupoma Foundation chairman Advocate Naznin Nirupoma Tithi, former chief scientific officer of Bangladesh Space Research and Remote Sensing Organization (SPARRSO) Obaidul Kader, Youth Sun president Makibul Hasan and WBB-Trust’s project officer Samiul Hasan spoke at the roundtable.
General secretary of POBA Abdus Sobhan has presented a keynote paper on ‘importance of biodiversity in poverty reduction’ at the roundtable.
The riverbed is being heavily silted up due to unplanned construction of roads, embankments and upstream withdrawal of water, the speakers said, adding that many rivers will disappear from the map of Bangladesh if such a situation prolongs.
There is a total of 982 species of wildlife in Bangladesh. Of them, 53 species of amphibian, 158 species of reptiles, 650 species of birds and 121 species of mammals are in Bangladesh.
According to the latest red list prepared by IUCN, a total of 390 species of wildlife are at risk. Of them, 56 are listed critical, 181 species are endangered and 153 species are under threat.
“There are about 300 rivers in Bangladesh now. Of them, 140 rivers are gasping for survival and 13 rivers are on their way to extinction,” Abdus Sobhan said in his keynote paper.
According to him, every year about 1.2-2.4 billion tonnes of sediment are carried by rivers entering Bangladesh.
“Lives of crores of people evolves round the years for ages. But their livelihood is now under threat due to disappearance of many rivers,” Sobhan said.
Even the lives of many wildlife is also under threat due to lack of food as many forests have already been killed, he added.
Abu Naser Khan said, 13,356 trees were cut from Sreepur to Joydebpur due to construction of Titas Gas supply lines. Besides, at least 3,247 more trees will cut for construction of BPC’s terminal at Moheshkhali and mini stadium at Kapasia, he added.
“The government has allocated 4,083 acres of forests for Rohingya people on humanitarian ground. Besides, the forest department has also allocated 1.67 lakh acres of land to various public and private organizations. Meanwhile, some ministry has sent letters to the ministry of forest and environment demanding to allocate 16,000 acres of land despite decision take in 2016 at cabinet meeting not to allocate forest land till 2022,” Khan said.
He said the world biggest mangrove forest Sundarbans is now under threat. Even the life of Royal Bengal Tiger is at endanger level, he added.
According to POBA chairman, “there are only 106 tigers in Sundarbans now though the number was 440 in 2004. A total of 32 species of fish has extinct in the last 50 years from Sundarbans.”
The speakers urged the authority concerned to protect the biodiversity from hands of unscrupulous people applying laws against them. – Staff Reporter
