Bangladesh's fish population dwindling as rivers vanishing

There is a proverb in Bangladesh that "Gola bhora Dhan, pukur bhora mach" meaning wicker corn-bin full of paddy and ponds full of fish, but the proverb is going to be untrue as many rivers of the country are vanishing.

But the fishery experts of the country are on their arms to protect the proverb keeping fish production in rivers and ponds.

Bangladesh is criss-crossed by around 230 rivers, including three major rivers Padma, Meghna and Jamuna.

Once this huge water area was highly productive for fish and contributed of 65-70 percent of total fish production about three decades ago.

But now less than 40 percent of fish production comes from this source.

The fish population has declined and the poor people in rural Bangladesh cannot have fish in their dishes as prices of fish have gone beyond their reachable mark.

According to expert, the wetlands declined by 70 percent in last 50 years. The wetlands measured around 9.3 million hectares 50 years ago, which has come down to about three million hectares. The expert said for boosting production of paddy, people are grabbing wetlands filling the rivers putting a huge pressure on wetlands.

Dr. Enamul Huq, senior scientific officer of Bangladesh Fishery Research Institute in northern Mymensingh, 120 km from Dhaka told Xinhua Saturday that that the country has 296 species of fish in sweet water and saline water and 511 species of sea fish, including shrimps.

Since abundant of fishes were in the rivers and water bodies, it is a very good resource for fish production, but population explosion during the past decades and use of huge waters for cultivation, widespread use of pesticides in agriculture and pollution of waters by industrialization had a great impact in the decline of fish.

Huq said of the total species of fishes, 54 species were endangered critically and 12 species are vulnerable.

He said Bangladesh annually required 2.6 million tons of fish whereas the country produces 2.2 million tons.

Bangladesh fetches around 285.71 million US dollars every year exporting fishes and frozen fish food, mainly shrimps to different countries.

Source: Xinhua