River Halda losing its fish resources
Monday, 11 January 2010
The river Halda in Chittagong, considered as the major source of Indian carpfry, is going to lose its fish resources over the next two decades because of intrusion of saline water due to sea-level rise, reports UNB.
"The river Halda will lose its sweet water flow eventually damaging the breeding grounds of Indian carps, as the sea level is likely to rise by 2 to 3 metres within 2050 brining in saline water," Prof Abdul Kader of the Institute of Marine Science and Fisheries at Chittagong University told the news agency.
Prof Kader said the Halda was the richest spawning ground of Indian major carps, including Catla fish (Catla catla), Ruhi fish (Labeo Rohita), Mrigal fish (Cirrhinus Marigala) and Kalbaoush (Labeo Calbasu) in Bangladesh. "Besides, 60 per cent of the country's pond carps culture is dependent on the fish fry naturally produced in the river."
He said that it was not only the sea-level rise, but there were also other reasons like over-fishing, massive sand lifting, water contamination by industrial wastes, destruction of various species of fish, including fry and mother fishes, geographical change and unchecked riverbank erosion are taking their toll on bio-diversity of the important river.
"The river Halda will lose its sweet water flow eventually damaging the breeding grounds of Indian carps, as the sea level is likely to rise by 2 to 3 metres within 2050 brining in saline water," Prof Abdul Kader of the Institute of Marine Science and Fisheries at Chittagong University told the news agency.
Prof Kader said the Halda was the richest spawning ground of Indian major carps, including Catla fish (Catla catla), Ruhi fish (Labeo Rohita), Mrigal fish (Cirrhinus Marigala) and Kalbaoush (Labeo Calbasu) in Bangladesh. "Besides, 60 per cent of the country's pond carps culture is dependent on the fish fry naturally produced in the river."
He said that it was not only the sea-level rise, but there were also other reasons like over-fishing, massive sand lifting, water contamination by industrial wastes, destruction of various species of fish, including fry and mother fishes, geographical change and unchecked riverbank erosion are taking their toll on bio-diversity of the important river.