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Untapped Resources in Swamps

by Alesandra Ibobo | 10-03-2018 18:54




This topic is one which most people especially here in Africa are not particularly interested in as individuals, especially when we don't reside close to regions where the swamps are located, and if we do, because they are characterized by slow-moving to stagnant waters, and are considered a breeding place for insects like the dragon flies, crickets, amphibians and mosquitoes which causes malaria one of the deadliest diseases in infants and children. Residents close to these swamps results into draining the swamps and perhaps use them for dumpings or channel their drainages/ sewages to it.

So I'd like to throw more light on swamps and its untapped resources. 
Swamps are, according to WWF (half the world's wetland have disappeared since 1900. Development and conversion continue to pose major threats to wetland despite its value and importance of economic value).

Agriculture and extensive farming activities like rice fields is one of the amazing resources of the swamps and wetlands. These farms helps in beautification of the environment, purification of oxygen and regulating the temperature. Source: world Atlas

The fish farm is also carried out in the rice fields as they eat harmful insects in the field and their waste helps in fertilizing the soil. In farming, swamps can serve as a source of free irrigation water and organic fertilizer for crops as I pointed out above, and also animals get pastures for it. So it's a good way of curbing food shortage in one's country.

Having outline these, government should invest on conservation of these swamps and wetland and also provide an alternative residential area of settlement for people living close to these swampy areas, and discourage people from living close to swamps because of the environmental and health hazards it has caused over the years. Lives of animals and aquatic species are endangered as well as the lives of the citizens, due to the channelling of drainage system and toxic c chemicals and waste materials into these swamps.