Bangladesh is poised to lose most of its marine fish population as a result of climate change, dealing a big blow to thousands of people dependent on fishing in the sea, according to experts. “Bangladesh has a long coastal belt of 710 kilometers with abundant marine resources. We’ve so far found some 475 species of marine fishes, 400 of mollusc and 200 species of sea-woods. Unfortunately, some of them have disappeared and many more are on the verge of extinction,” Prof Nani Gopal Das of Chittagong University’s Marine Biology Department told UNB.

The scientific names of some of the marine fishes of various countries, including Bangladesh, which have been included in the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) are Johnius coitor, Nematalosa galatheae, Pseudapocryptes elongates, Thunnus albacares, Thunnus obesus and Xiphias gladius. Prof Nani Gopal said monsoon variations, frequent droughts and severe storms will also kill the fish in inland freshwater bodies and affect their breeding patterns.

“When there will be a significant effect on the ecosystems, this would also endanger a vital food source in some coastal areas.”

He added: “Several fishes as we mentioned will be eliminated from these areas if they cannot quickly adapt to the changing salinity levels. Fishes are very sensitive to temperature too and some species – those that can’t swim very far – may go locally extinct.”

Nani Gopal pointed out a number of reasons behind the ecological degradation of the Bay of Bengal. These include increase in sea temperature due to global warming; increase in salinity due to environmental pollution, habitat conversion of the marine fishes; massive resource consumption by the growing population; introduction of exotic species; and commercial exploitation or over-hunting.

According to an international study conducted by WorldFish with support from the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), both coastal and landlocked countries in Africa, including Malawi, Guinea, Senegal and Uganda, four Asian tropical countries – Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan and Yemen – and two countries in South America, Peru and Colombia, are the most economically vulnerable to the effects of global warming on fisheries.

Overall, of the 33 countries that were considered highly vulnerable, 19 are already classified by the United Nations as “least developed” due to their particularly poor socioeconomic conditions. According to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), fishes provide more than 2.6 billion people worldwide with at least 20 percent of their average annual per capita protein intake.

The “highly vulnerable” countries identified in the WorldFish study produce 20 percent of the world’s fish exports (by value). The researchers note that these countries should be on a priority list for adaptation efforts that will allow them to endure the effects of climate change and maintain or enhance the contributions that fisheries can make to poverty reduction.

Worried at the rapid climate change, Prof Nani Gopal said the impact of climate change on fisheries and aquaculture is already being felt. In marine waters, extreme weather events will increase in frequency and intensity – the most well known of these is the El Nino phenomenon in the South Pacific.

AFM Shahidur Rahman, an environmentalist, said the ongoing warming of the world’s oceans is likely to continue, but with geographical differences and some decadal variability. Warming is more intense in surface waters but is not exclusive to these with the Atlantic showing particularly clear signs of deep warming. He said changes in fish distributions in response to climate variations have already been observed, generally involving pole ward expansions of warmer-water species and pole ward contractions of colder-water species.

Prof Nani Gopal said shifts in ocean salinity are occurring, with near-surface waters in the more evaporative regions of most of the world’s oceans increasing in salinity, while marine areas in high latitudes are showing decreasing salinity due to greater precipitation, higher runoff, melting ice and other atmospheric processes. And the oceans are becoming more acidic, with probable negative consequences to many coral reef and calcium-bearing organisms.

He put forward three recommendations – developing a proper management policy, conservation of biodiversity through pollution control and maintenance of the breeding ground – to protect the endangered marine fish populations.

“The 200 species of sea-woods growing around the St Martin’s Island are the main food of the marine fishes,” he said, underscoring the need for protection of these planktons as these creature play a vital role in maintaining the ecological balance of the sea.

source : www.waterworld.com

  

ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa did not surrender with his aides and family. It’s reliably learnt that he was actually lured into a trap while trying to escape from Cox’s Bazaar near Chittagong in Bangladesh.

In a planned intelligence operation handled at the highest levels in the government, the first inputs about Rajkhowa’s plans to escape from Bangladesh came soon after the “surrender” of ULFA finance secretary Chitrabon Hazarika and foreign secretary Shashadhar Chowdhury in November first week.

A rattled Rajakhowa, sources said, had realised that the heat was growing on ULFA members in Bangladesh and that it was not safe for him or his family to continue staying there. He is believed to have then been in touch with Mukul Hazarika of Assam Watch, who is based in London. While it is not clear with whom Hazarika then got in touch, sources said Rajkhowa was ultimately put on to some local Bangladeshi contacts to make good his escape.

source :http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Rajkhowa-did-not-surrender–he-was-trapped-in-a-sting-operation/550546

I did not surrender: ULFA chief
ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa on Saturday said that he did not surrender and also did not have any plans to surrender even as the outfit’s commanderin- chief Paresh Barua denied reports of rift within its ranks.

Rajkhowa made the statement when he was being produced in the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) here along with his bodyguard Raja Barua and the outfit’s deputy commander-inchief Raju Barua.

Upon their arrival here from the Assam Police guest house around 5.30 p m, Rajkhowa said, “I have not surrendered and will not surrender”.

At this time, youths, believed to be ULFA sympathisers, shouted slogans, “ULFA zindabad”, “Paresh Barua zindabad”, “Arabinda Rajkhowa zindabad” etc.

They also urged the rebel leaders not to surrender.

These happened in full view of the police and CRPF personnel deployed at the court complex.

Earlier, the arrested ULFA leaders were taken to the CJM court in a convoy of vehicles amidst unprecedented security arrangements. All three of them were handcuffed. The court remanded them to 12 days police custody.

The BSF had on Friday claimed that the ULFA leaders had surrendered along with their wives and children before their personnel at Dawki in Meghalaya.

source : http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=India+ticks+off+China,+Myanmar&artid=GkhFe/fGxek=&SectionID=b7ziAYMenjw=&MainSectionID=b7ziAYMenjw=&SEO=ULFA+chairman+Arabinda+Rajkhowa&SectionName=pWehHe7IsSU=

source :www.energybangla.com

About 15 million (1.5 crore) people in Bangladesh alone could be on the move by 2050 because of climate change, causing the worst migration in human history. “They’ll get displaced as temperatures are rising and desertification has set in where rainfall is needed most. They’ll be on the move since more potent monsoons are making flood-prone areas worse,” said AFM Shahidur Rahman, an environmentalist. “They’ll desert their homesteads because they’ll find their villages under water due to sea-level rise caused by melting glaciers, and the slow and deadly seepage of saline water into their wells and fields,” he added. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a minimum of 207 million people in Latin America , Asia and Africa will not have enough water inside a decade. In Asia , an extra 130 million people will be at risk of hunger by the middle of the century. By 2100, crop revenues in Africa will drop 90 percent. And scientists see Bangladesh as ground zero. The country’s 150 million inhabitants live in the delta of three waterways about the size of Iowa , and the majority of the country sits less than 20 feet above sea level. The IPCC statistics show that rising sea levels will wipe out more cultivated land in Bangladesh than anywhere in the world. By 2050, rice production is expected to drop 10 percent and wheat production by 30 percent. Experts say the first shifts will start within countries. Scientists see families flocking from rural and coastal areas to cities where livelihoods are less tied to fickle weather patterns. It’s a pattern that is already happening against a background of rapid global urbanization, in which the desperate rate of urban population growth far outpaces jobs and infrastructure. Nearly 3.5 million people in Dhaka , about 40 percent of those live in slums. The World Bank estimates that by mid-century, half of all Bengalis will live in urban centers. The next step in the migration pattern is across national borders. Military experts predict a downward spiral of violence and conflict as people desperate for food, water and jobs cross into neighboring countries where resources may be only slightly less scarce. Wealthy nations like the United States and the European Union, meanwhile, could also be asked to take in millions of the world’s displaced people even as they negotiate international disputes. “Those people who are most vulnerable right now, and having a problem of just surviving, and having the normal development challenges of clean water, fighting disease, getting an education – those are the ones most affected,” said Koko Warner, head of the Environmental Migration, Social Vulnerability and Adaptation Section at the U.N. University. In Bangladesh , the issues are magnified by the density of the population. Any climate-induced disaster “inevitably affects millions of people,” researcher James Pender wrote in a recent sweeping report on Bangladesh . He estimated that by 2080, almost all the 51 million to 97 million people currently living in coastal zones may have to leave. The worst-off won’t even be able to do that. “If those who are causing the greenhouse gas emissions are unable to control carbon emissions, the people in the vulnerable areas, many of the coastal areas, are going to be inundated,” said Shahidur Rahman. He added: “The vulnerable, the uneducated, the lowest of the communities will never be able to migrate to the U.S. , to Canada , to Australia . There will be pressure on the not-so-vulnerable part of Bangladesh .” Cities like Dhaka are bursting at the seams. Migration to other smaller cities appears to be occurring at a higher rate as well though the government leaders are reluctant to acknowledge the reality. The hardest hit, experts say, will be the families who won’t be able to move. They are the ones most vulnerable to traffickers and others who prey upon the poorest of the poor. They are left to make do as best they can, say social scientists. It is unclear how the government will feed, house or find enough clean water for vast numbers of climate refugees in a country of 150 million people crammed into an area of merely 55,500 sq miles. Experts think that Bangladesh should change cultivation practices to boost food security, plant large areas of forest in flood-prone areas along rivers and the coast, and build embankments to cope with the emerging problems.

Bangladesh will continue its ban on rice exports, possibly into next year, in order to hold down local prices of the staple food, the government said on Saturday.

“The decision on rice export for both aromatic and non aromatic may continue after 2009 to keep the rising price within the capacity of common people,” said Pius Costa, government director general of food.

“The government has issued the order to reimpose the ban last week prohibiting export of both aromatic and non-aromatic rice till the year-end of 2009,” he told Reuters.

Since May last year the government has imposed a ban on exporting rice which ended last month.

“We welcomed government’s decision as we do not know about the output of Aman rice,” said K. A. Mannan, the managing director of Mabco Food Limited, a leading importer and exporter of wheat and rice.

Aman is one of the main rice varieties in Bangladesh. Bangladesh produces around 30 million tonnes of rice, nearly sufficient to feed its more than 150 million people.

“Moreover Indian traders are negotiating with us for importing rice from our country,” Mannan told Reuters, suggesting a ban on all kinds of rice exports should continue for another year.

Other hand

The Bangladesh food and disaster management ministry has re-floated a tender to import 60,000 tonnes of wheat by April, a senior official said on Saturday.

The tender was floated after the authorities had cancelled the results of tenders issued in September and October to import a similar quantity of wheat.

The tender seeking the crop of the current year from any origin will close on Jan. 3 with validity up to Jan. 24. The shipment should be within 60 days of signing of the deal.

The food ministry has issued several tenders to buy wheat since September. The last was floated last month to purchase a similar quantity of wheat.

For the re-floated tender, bidders may offer a minimum quantity of 30,000 tonnes and 60 percent of the offer should be delivered at the country’s main Chittagong port and the rest to Mongla port on a cost, insurance and freight (CIF) basis.

Out of the tenders issued since September to buy more than 500,000 tonnes wheat, authorities so far have purchased only 100,000 tonnes wheat of Ukraine origin from an European trader.

Bangladesh plans to import 750,000 wheat in the year ending June 2010 to rebuild its stocks, officials said.

Bangladesh, which consumes rice as a staple food, produces about one million tonnes of wheat annually. It also produces around 30 million tonnes of rice, nearly sufficient to feed its almost 150 million people

The 17,000 people visiting Denmark for global talks on reducing greenhouse gases will release as much carbon dioxide during the two-week event as about 200,000 U.S. passenger cars do in the period.

Environmental activists, government envoys, business leaders and journalists will emit 40,500 tons of the global- warming gas traveling to and within Copenhagen and for electricity and heat in their hotels and meeting rooms, according to an estimate by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which oversees the talks. Denmark’s government says it intends to offset the gases.

“The fact that all these people are flying into Copenhagen is a wonderful irony,” Adair Turner, chairman of a committee that advises the U.K. government on climate change, said in an interview. He’s taking the “more carbon-friendly” approach of appearing at the conference via video conference, Turner said.

Envoys from more than 190 nations aim to devise an agreement while in Copenhagen to cut emissions of heat-trapping gases that UN-sponsored scientists have said are causing “unequivocal” global warming, threatening to increase droughts and raise sea levels, swamping island-nations and coastal towns.

Attendees at the Dec. 7-18 talks include U.S. President Barack Obama, Royal Dutch Shell Plc Chief Executive Officer Peter Voser, and Prince Charles, the heir to the U.K. throne.

The emissions equal those of 203,302 typical passenger cars in 14 days, according to Bloomberg calculations using U.S. Environmental Protection Agency data. The average car travels about 12,500 miles (20,000 kilometers) a year, releasing 11,450 pounds (5,200 kilograms) of carbon dioxide, according to the U.S. agency.

Kiribati, Brick-Making

The output is similar to the CO2 emitted by the Pacific island-nation of Kiribati in a year of burning fossil fuels for power, heat and transportation. Kiribati’s 110,000 inhabitants released about 40,000 tons of CO2 in 2006, according to U.S. Department of Energy data on Bloomberg.

The atolls are some of the most threatened by global warming, and Kiribati President Anote Tong told Bloomberg in February that his Pacific nation may buy land abroad to relocate its people in the face of rising seas caused by climate change.

Denmark has set aside 5 million kroner ($1 million) to help pay for a project in Bangladesh that will reduce emissions in the brick-making industry, compensating for the summit’s greenhouse gases, said Christian van Maarschalkerweerd, chief program coordinator at the Danish Energy Agency.

“There are more than 6,000 brick kilns in Bangladesh, many located around Dhaka,” van Maarschalkerweerd said in a telephone interview from Copenhagen. “They’re heavily polluting and not very advanced. This project is introducing a more environmentally friendly brick-production technology.”

Energy ‘Sea-Change’

Twenty new kilns will be built, reducing emissions by a combined 100,000 tons per year, according to the Danish official. The project will generate tradable carbon credits, each representing a ton of avoided emissions under the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism, he said. Denmark and the World Bank will each buy a portion of the credits, he said.

The UN calculations are based on the assumption delegates will stay for 14 days. The exact emissions of the summit won’t be known until after the Copenhagen meeting, when it’s clear how many delegates have turned up, how they’ve traveled and how far they’ve come, said John Hay, a spokesman for the UNFCCC.

“If the conference manages to bring about a sea-change in how energy is produced and consumed, then the amount of emissions caused by the meeting will be truly microscopic in comparison to what can be achieved in terms of emission reductions,” Hay said in an e-mailed reply to questions.
Source :www.bloomberg.com