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Protecting Our Biodiversity |
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by Sumit Chowdhury | 05-05-2019 14:14
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Like our other natural resources, biodiversity is playing a crucial role in our economic development and achieving human wellbeing. Besides keeping our air breathable, biodiversity serves us with food, water supply, medicines, clothes, shelters and more..It is, however, difficult to understand and measure all contributions of biodiversity to our lives given, on the one hand, the multifaceted nature of these contributions and, on the other, the complex relationships between the natural ecosystems and the ones we have modified. It is possible, for example, to reckon the contribution of Hilsha fish to Bangladeshes national economy. Bangladesh is biologically very diverse. Its geographical location, deltaic structure, and sub-tropical climate have made it a home of about 4,200 plant species (from angiosperms to mosses) in its evergreen, semi-evergreen and deciduous forests on the hills and plain lands; in mangroves; and in numerous rivers and wetlands. Our natural and man-made ecosystems also harbour 133 species of mammal, 711 species of bird, 174 species of reptile, 64 species of amphibian, 270 species of freshwater fish, and 4,500 species of invertebrate, including 185 crustacean and 305 butterfly species. These numbers are just amazing since we are talking about a country where on average 1,100 people live in every square kilometre. To protect Bangladesh's rich biodiversity, many initiatives have long been taken, especially in the recent decade. Many biodiversity-rich areas have been declared as National Parks, Wildlife Sanctuaries, Ecologically Critically Areas, Eco-Parks, Safari Parks and Botanical Gardens protected by the laws. A total of 51 such protected sites, including 37 Protected Areas, now cover almost four percent of the country. In 2014, Bangladesh declared “Swatch of No-Ground” in the Bay of Bengal, the first Marine Protected Area of the country. This together with the “Middle Ground and South Patches” of the Bay now constitute more than 2 percent of the total marine area of Bangladesh under protection. Species conservation has also received significant push in the last few years. Bengal Tiger, Asian Elephant, dolphins, primates, vultures, gharial, different globally threatened bird and turtle species are, to name a few, major groups. These initiatives are now not only restricted to Bangladesh, but linked with regional and global ventures. Since the early 1960s, IUCN has been estimating the status of global biodiversity by calculating the extinction risk of thousands of species. IUCN regularly produces the Red List of threatened species of the world, of regions, and of selected countries. The latest animal Red List of Bangladesh (IUCN Bangladesh 2015; www.iucnredlistbd.org), has listed 390 species as threatened in Bangladesh – almost 25 percent of 1,619 species assessed. From the earlier IUCN Red List of 2000, we knew that we had lost 13 wildlife species from Bangladesh in the last 100 years. Fifteen years on, the latest Red List of Bangladesh alarms us that another 18 species have joined the Regionally Extinct list. We often talk about population pressure as the key reason for biodiversity loss. Human actions are indeed degrading and fragmenting habitats, changing land use patterns, and modifying hydrological systems on a large, landscape scale. Over-exploitation of resources, pollutions, and introduction of invasive species by us are also posing direct threats to our biodiversity and undermining the conservation measures. As our economy grows, industrialisation and energy consumption increases, and urbanisation expands, we do see our institutional and legal systems continue promoting unsustainable resource exploitation. In ever-changing social and economic environments, we need to promote innovations in biodiversity conservation. Such innovations may range from using drones for biodiversity exploration and monitoring to using digital simulations as tools for awareness, influencing and decision-making, to incentive mechanisms for safe-guarding ecosystems. As we progress towards Vision 2021, we expect that people's participation and political will for biodiversity protection increases day by day. We want to see our conservation policies and decisions supported by up-to-date knowledge and facts. We want to see a culture and a system of evidence-based decision making. We expect an ecosystem where conservation practices, knowledge and policies interact with each other, making each other stronger.
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Previous : [Biodiversity]
6 Comments
Hello Sumit
Thank you for your report about protecting the biodiversity.
Green Cheers from Nepal :)
Keep writing great reports.
We are eager to read more reports from you.
Regards,
Kushal Naharki
Posted 17-06-2019 04:21
Hello sumeet
Biodiversity is a natural wealth that is aiding economically as well.
But human greed has threatened them.
Thank you so much for this wonderful report.
Green cheers
Posted 17-05-2019 20:30
Hello Sumit,
Thank you for sharing your article that reminds us of how important it is to protect biodiversity.
Wonhee Mentor
Posted 08-05-2019 21:40
Hi Sumit,
Thank you for your time for this report, but I am disappointed to see that you simply copied the report from The Daily Star (https://www.thedailystar.net/environment-and-climate-action/protecting-our-biodiversity-1367083). Please rephrase this report ASAP and of course, this will not be counted as the proper submission.
Thanks,
Louis Mentor
Posted 08-05-2019 21:08
Greetings Sumit,
Thank you for this thorough report on the importance of protecting our biodiversity.
Agreed, we should promotive innovative biodiversity conservation in correspondence to the ever-changing social and economic environments.
Keep up the good work!
Sincerely,
Eco Generation
Posted 08-05-2019 11:24
@ Sumit,
So amazed to listen that your country's richness in Biodiversity and good initiative for its protection. Yeah, we should join our hand for it!
Thanks for Share.
Posted 05-05-2019 15:27