Foot soldiers of Sundarbans arm against global warming

By Soudhriti Bhabani Aug 25, 2007, 4:06 GMT

Sundarbans (West Bengal), Aug 25 (IANS) Sanatan Dolui, a senior school student, now understands the catastrophic effects of global warming on his remote island in the Bay of Bengal.

Armed with saplings of mangrove trees that act as a shield against storms and rising water levels and also protect marine life, the residents of Sundarbans have formed a front against global warming.

Over 40,000 school students this week sowed saplings along the river embankment - the area has a total embankment length of 3,500 km - besides depositing one bucket of soil each on the natural dam in the dense Sundarban mangrove forests of eastern India.

'We have seen how some islands have been submerged by the rising water levels and how some mangrove forests were destroyed by coastal flooding. Earlier we didn't know the exact reason of this natural disaster but now we can understand it very well,' said Douli as he, along with his entire family, planted mangrove tree, eucalyptus and mango saplings .

'If we have to survive on the land of our forefathers, we have to protect it in a natural way,' Dolui said enthusiastically.

The alluvial archipelago called the Sundarbans, formed by 56 crisscrossing islands, has been declared a World Heritage site by Unesco for its rich biodiversity and is home to the famed Royal Bengal Tiger.

Located in South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, it is a vast area covering 4,262 sq km, including a mangrove cover of 2,125 sq km in India alone, with a larger portion in Bangladesh.

Sundarban Development Minister Kanti Ganguly is one concerned man as he spearheads the initiative of mangrove planting here.

'We have to take adequate measures for protecting 9,630 sq km of Sundarbans from the dire consequence of climate change. It's a serious concern for 4.2 million people residing there,' Ganguly told IANS.

He said all people there took a pledge on Sundarban Day, Aug 21, to plant mangrove saplings along river embankments, reduce the use of petrol and diesel and also completely prohibit the use of plastic in the delta region.

Sundarbans, a vast tract of forest and saltwater swamps, is located at the lower part of the Ganges delta extending about 260 km along the Bay of Bengal from the Hooghly river estuary in India to the Meghna river estuary in Bangladesh.

The Sundarbans are part of the world's largest delta formed by the rivers Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna. The whole tract of forest reaches inland for about 100-130 km from the confluence.

'I address all school students and children of the Sundarbans to join hands in this noble effort as they are our next generation. They are supposed to face the worst consequence of this global environmental crisis,' Ganguly added.

In the past two decades, four islands of the Sundarbans - Bedford, Lohachara, Kabasgadi and Suparibhanga - have sunk into the sea and 6,000 families have been displaced from their villages.

Lohachara island was the first inhabited island to disappear due to global warming. There are multiple causes of the disappearances of islands in the delta, including a rise in sea levels, coastal erosion, cyclones, mangrove destruction and coastal flooding.

The loss of land has created thousands of environmental refugees in the area. Since the first settlements in 1770, the overall population of the Sundarbans has also risen 200 percent to nearly 4.2 million.

'The average rate of sea level rise at Sagar point is 3.14 mm per year while this figure is 5 mm at Pakhiraloy point near Sajnekhali in the Sundarbans. Both these figures are much higher than the global average of 2 mm per annum,' said Pranabesh Sanyal, a teacher in Jadavpur University's department of oceanographic studies and a member of the West Bengal Bio-Diversity Board.

A study also pointed out that the Sundarbans would lose another 15 percent of its total habitable land, displacing more than 30,000 people by 2020, he told IANS.

According to reports, about 30 percent out of 95 sq.km of the Sagar area has already gone into the sea.

'There are three other islands - Dalhousie, Bhangadoyani and Ghoramara - which are at present under serious threat of climate change. Almost 20 percent of both Dalhousie and Bhangadoyani and over 60 percent of the Ghoramara island have already been affected by rising water levels in the Sundarbans,' he said.

The increased salinity of water is another problem in that region which has affected Sundari trees - a particular type of mangrove plant.

The rise in sea level also threatens the tiger population here. The core tiger habitat areas are Dalhousie and Bhangadoyani, which are gradually going under water, forcing tigers to migrate from southern to northern Sundarbans near Sudhannakhali and Sojnekhali.

© 2007 Indo-Asian News Service