Jehangir Hussain :
The Meghna River Basin, shared by Bangladesh and India, has 29 transboundary rivers originating in India and flows through Bangladesh before falling into the Bay of Bengal.
The Meghna River Basin is the ‘biogeographical gateway’ located in the transition zone between Indian, Indo-Malayan and Indoa-Chinese regions.
The ecosystem services provided by the river basin directly support life and livelihoods of over 50 million people in Bangladesh and India including the Khasia, Garo and the Jaintia communities.
Experts called for boosting cooperation for joint solutions and basin level integrated approaches to tackle challenges posed by recurring floods and droughts troubling millions of people in the two neighbouring countries.
Speaking at a recent dialogue, Planning Minister Abdul Mannan called for increasing cooperation between the two countries to make the Meghna River Basin ‘most vibrant region in South Asia’, according to a press release issue by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
Saber Hossain Chowhudhry, MP, Chairperson, Parliamentary Standing Committee on Environment, Forest and Climate Change Ministry, called for moving from conflict to cooperation through Meghna Knowledge Forum (MKF).
PR Sambharia, Senior Joint Commissioner, Ground Water and Flood Management at Indian Jal Shakti Ministry, requested the IUCN to share its findings with Bangladesh-India Joint River Commission and provide them to the relevant government departments of the two countries.
Malik Fida A Khan, Executive Director, Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services, said that Article 6 of the Framework Agreement for Cooperation between Bangladesh and India, mandates the two countries to work together for the preservation of ecosystems of shared rivers. He said, ‘this provides an entry-point for strengthening cooperation for the formation of the Mghna River Basin Organisation for multi-level cooperation for the sustainable management of the Meghna Basin.’
“We felt the need to assess the downstream benefits to the people in Bangladesh from such initiatives. However, this will help build trust between stakeholders from across the border and for the benefit of 50 million people living in the region shared by the two countries across the border,” said Dr P Shakil Ahammed, Principal Secretary, Water Resources, Fisheries, Food and Civil Supplies.
Over 50 million people in Bangladesh and India, particularly, farmers, fishermen and forest dependent communities like the Khasis, the Garo and the Jainita in the wetlands, known as the haors in Sylhet region of Bangladesh depend on the basin for their sustenance.
‘There is no alternative to cooperation and working together,” said Planning Minister Mannan at the first ever knowledge forum on the Meghna River basin. The participants shared their perspectives on the wide range of issues linked to culture, water governance, climate change and inland navigation to promote partnerships among the stakeholders and sectors as well as to address knowledge gaps in the implementation of an Integrated Water Resource Management in the Meghna River basin.
Highlighting the significance of Barak-Meghna river system, Dr Rajdeep Roy, MP, from Silchar, Assam, India said, ‘Barak River is rich in biodiversity and more than 100 species of fish, including the Ganges Dolphin, listed as endangered species have been recorded from the Barak River in India.’
‘More than 70 community managed fish sanctuaries have been established across Meghalaya, and many of these are located in transboundary tributaries of the Meghna river basin, such as the Someshwari and Simsang rivers originating from Garo hills in India. The initiative led to increase in the fish population and improvement in water quality,’ said Dr P Shakil Ahammed.
The Meghna Basin supports one of the largest Hilsa fisheries in the world, providing a source of protein for millions of people living in Bangladesh and India.
Vishwa Ranjan, Programme Officer, Water and Wetlands, IUCN Asia, said, ‘most of the forest cover of the basin is located in India, and these sequester carbon and are important for the climate regulation across the basin. The basin also includes more than 1,000 wetlands located in the Haor region of Bangladesh and the Barak Valley of India, these buffers against flooding and also provide habitat for thousands of migratory waterfowl annually.’
The basin has high cultural significance, with a number of indigenous communities including Jaintia and Khasia living in the basin, ‘The ancient Jaintia kingdom used to span both sides of the border and was replete with monuments, cultures, folklore and art forms. The ancient Jadukata River festival is one example of the cultural value of the rivers for the people and celebrated till today’ said Sabyasach Dutta, executive director, Asian Confluence.
Despite its importance, the Meghna Basin faces a range of threats, and a recent study, supported by IUCN shows that there are large socio-economic disparities throughout the region.
Dr Saudamini Das, professor, the Institute of Economic Growth, Delhi University, said, ‘Indigenous communities living in the forest dominated landscapes of Meghna Basin are poor and depend on the forest for their socio-economic well-being. Development of innovative Payment of Ecosystem Services mechanisms could provide economic security of indigenous people and the protection of watersheds for the long-term water security across the basin.’
FW Blah, Chief Forest Officer of the Jaintia Hills Autonomous District Council, Meghalaya spoke on the impact of mining and shifting cultivation on the forests of the Jaintia Hills, the source of many transboundary tributaries of the Meghna River, including Myntdu and Umngot. He said, destructive mining has stopped, but deforestation, forest fragmentation, and soil degradation continues to threaten the ecosystem. Blah described the Jaintia Hills Autonomous Council as an elected governing body of the Jaintia people and that it plays a key role to promote the region’s culture.
Dr AK Enamul Haque, Director of the Asian Centre for Development, Dhaka, discussed the potentials of bilateral benefits of sharing the Meghna Basin. In last 40 years, Bangladesh and India paid attention to discuss sharing the Ganges waters, now there had been a shift to use the rivers for common benefits, he said.
The IUCN will disseminate the outcomes of the Meghna Knowledge Forum (MKF) at bilateral and global platforms, including at the September 2021 IUCN World Conservation Congress, to be held in Marseille, France, said the IUCN press release.
(Mr. Jehangir is a journalist. Email: [email protected])
