J. Asiat. Soc. Bangladesh, Sci. 49(1): 71-83, June 2023 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3329/jasbs.v49i1.
67597
WETLAND DEGRADATION AND CONSERVATION OF NATURAL
RESOURCES IN HAOR AREAS: A STUDY AT TAHIRPUR AND
DHARMAPASHA UPAZILAS OF SHUNAMGANJ DISTRICT
SHAH ISRAT AZMERY, MD. HUMAYUN KABIR* AND
MD. FERDOUS-UR-RAHMAN BHUIYAN
Department of Geography and Environment, University of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Abstract
The study investigates the issues concerning wetland degradation and analyzes the
conservation and management initiatives of natural resources in the study area. Using
both quantitative and qualitative methods, primary data were collected from two selected
upazilas (Tahirpur and Dharmapasha) of the Sunamganj district. For the survey, 150
households were selected in 9 villages. Four focus group discussions and 8 key informant
interviews were also carried out. Data from the landsat satellite images have been
analyzed using the NDWI and the supervised image classification approach. The study
results demonstrate that the deep water area in Dharmapasha and Tahirpur upazila have
declined by more than 17 km2, and 26 km2, respectively, between 1989 and 2019. In
addition, due to overexploitation and mismanagement, the wetland resources have been
greatly reduced, leading to degradation. However, the conservation of natural resources
in the study area faces many challenges due to lack of proper management practices.
Keywords: Wetland degradation, Natural resources, Haor, Water body, Conservation
challenges, Sunamganj.
Introduction
Wetlands in Bangladesh include rivers, streams, freshwater lakes, marshes, haors, baors,
beels, fishponds, artificial lakes, flooded cultivated lands, and estuarine systems with
wide mangrove swamps (Rahman et al. 1996; Chakraborty 2009). In every sector,
wetland provides a wide range of benefits, which is important for a country’s economic
development (Ramsar Convention Bureau 1971). As a result, globally, a wide range of
human interventions are reported to be responsible for the change of wetland functions
and degradation (O’Connell 2003; Erwin 2009). However, the wetlands of Bangladesh
have a great role in supporting the economic, ecological, and commercial sectors. They
are highly rich in biodiversity. Poor communities live adjacent to the wetlands to secure
livelihoods (Rahman et al. 2001). Akhter et al. (2018) reported that the wetlands of
Bangladesh are degraded rapidly due to the increasing pressure of rapid population
growth. The degradation of the floodplain is also closely related to the rapid decline in
freshwater biodiversity, habitat alteration, flood control, habitat invasion, and pollutions
72 Azmery et al.
are the reasons for wetland degradation (Tookner and Stanford 2002). The climate
change phenomenon has also recently been reported as a threat to the livelihood of the
haor community (Monwar et al. 2014).
Geographically Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world due to
climate change. It is a major threat to the survival of the species and wetland ecosystem,
and it may also affect the hydrology of individual ecosystems of wetlands (Hulme 2005;
Erwin 2009). On the other hand, lack of institutional coordination and awareness,
intensive agriculture, siltation, and pollution are the major causes of wetland degradation.
As a result, many species of flora and fauna are threatened, and the ecosystem is
deteriorating in the wetland region (Byomkesh et al. 2008). Therefore, the Bangladesh
government has enacted a significant number of laws and adopted policies to protect the
natural environment from extinction, as well as to conserve natural resources. In 1990,
the country seriously recognized the importance of resource management, and
consequently, wetland management and conservation become a significant priority.
These initiatives were helpful for the sustainable use of wetland resources (Chakraborty
2009; Islam 2010; IUCN 2015). Williams (2002) reported that community participation
in the conservation and management of wetland resources is essential and required for the
conservation wetland resources. In addition, implementating any management plan or
strategy on wetlands requires the active participation of the local people (Dugan 1990).
However, in the study of wetland areas, the poor local communities entirely depend on
natural resources (e.g., fisheries, fuel wood collection, dry season agriculture, grazing,
etc.) of the wetlands in the study areas. Until, Tanguar Haor was declared a Ramsar site
in 2000, the wetlands of the study areas used to be leased out to the influential local
elites, and the leaseholders used to exploit as much as they could. Such overexploitation
of the natural resources (fisheries, fuel woods, etc.) in the study wetlands leads to
degradation. As soon as Tanguar Haor was declared as the country’s second Ramsar site,
the management of wetlands of the study areas went under Sunamganj district
administration, excluding local people from resource use. This situation triggers conflicts
between the user groups and the administration. The recent development is that the beels
(that deeper section of the wetlands that retains water throughout the year) have been
distributed by the administration among the cooperatives formed by local people. Poor
local communities often fail to manage enough funds to form a cooperative for taking a
lease of the beels from the administration. Local rich people (often influential political
leaders) are reported to take advantage of giving loans to the poor user groups and exploit
wetland resources as extent as possible. The paper focuses on how the wetlands are
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 73
degraded over the period and unveils the challenges faced by current management
practices and initiatives undertaken by the stakeholders of the wetlands.
Objectives of the study: The objectives of the present study are to identify the areal
changes of the wetlands from 1989 to 2019 to evaluate the challenges faced in current
management practices and explore initiatives being undertaken for the conservation of
wetlands in the study areas.
Study area: Tahirpur and Dharmapasha are the two-selected upazila of Sunamgonj
district in the Sylhet division (Fig. 1). The study area is located at 25.07150N, 91.39920E.
The Indian state of Meghalaya bonds Tahirpur to the north, Dharmapasha and Jamalgonj
upazilas on the south, Bishwambarpur on the east, and Dharmapasha upazila on the west.
Dharmapasha is located on the bank of the Kongsha River, which is very close to the
haor areas of Sunamgonj district. Nine villages were selected to accomplish this research.
Marala, Matian, Tahirpur, Jamlabad, Bhabanipur, and Anandanagar are selected from
Tahirpur upazila, and two villages such as Rangsipara and Haor para, are selected from
Dharmapasha.
Fig. 1. Location of the study area. (Source: BBS, 2015).
74 Azmery et al.
These nine villages are adjacent to haor, and the people of this area are extremely
dependent on natural resources.
Materials and Methods
Data collection: The individual household survey employed close-ended and open-ended
questions. One hundred fifty households were selected in nine villages for the
questionnaire survey. Four Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were conducted with the
villagers, such as farmers, fishermen, day laborers, and local people of the study area.
The study was conducted with 08 Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) to explore the current
issues, present initiatives for managing haor resources, and possible steps, necessary for
haor conservation. KIIs covering government officials, journalists, leaseholders, and
other organizations for collecting in-depth information were also carried out. Secondary
materials were collected from relevant institutions like International Union for
Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Alongside, journals, books, and other printed documents
were consulted.
Techniques of data analysis and Map making: Statistical Package for the Social Science
(SPSS) has been used to analyze and interpret the collected questionnaire data.
Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI = GREEN-NIR/GREEN+NIR) and
supervised classification of Landsat satellite images are performed to illustrate the deep
water and shallow water of the study area. The deep and shallow water extent
information was necessary to identify the rate of changes in water bodies. Hence, deep
and shallow water extent was analyzed to assess the changes of waterbody over the
period in the study area. Here, the deep blue and light blue colors were also used to
represent the deep and shallow waterbodies, respectively.
Methodology of extracting the waterbodies: Landsat satellite images were collected from
the USGS Global Visualization Viewer (GloVis) (https://glovis.usgs.gov/app) to extract
information on the research area at different times in an attempt to reach the study's
objectives.
Image enhancement, radiometric correction, layer stacking, and subset have been used to
pre-process the selected Landsat satellite images using ERDAS Imagine software.
ERDAS Imagine 2014 has been used to complete the NDWI (Table 1). ArcGIS 10.8 has
been used to classify the NDWI images using the supervised image classification method.
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 75
The area of the water body has been calculated, and maps have been created to illustrate
the decadal variations of the shallow and deep water bodies for both Tahirpur and
Dharmapasha upazilas.
Table 1. References of satellite imagery used in the study.
Satellite ID Sensor ID Path/Row Acquisition date Spatial resolution
(m)
Landsat 4 TM (Thematic Mapper) 137/043 13-02-1989 30
Landsat 5 TM (Thematic Mapper) 137/043 17-02-1999 30
Landsat 5 TM (Thematic Mapper) 137/043 28-02-2009 30
Landsat 8 OLI (Operational Land Imager) 137/043 07-01-2019 30
Results and Discussion
Changes of water body in Dharmapasha upazila: Normalized Difference Water Index
and supervised classification of Landsat satellite images show the downward trend of
deep water (Fig. 2a & 2b) from 1989 to 2019. On the other hand, the shallow water of the
study area has an upward trend from 1989 to 2009. However, from 2009 to 2019, shallow
water had a downward trend due to various reasons. Table 2 and the satellite images (Fig.
2) show the decadal scenario of waterbodies and how their reduction and expansion
process passed from 1989 to 2019. In 1989, the total area of deep waterbodies of
Dharmapasha was 33.28 km2, and the shallow waterbodies were 34.36 km2.
The satellite image of 1989 shows the maximum deep waterbody in the north- eastern
part of the area. Besides some other deep-water bodies are scattered towards the eastern
and south- eastern parts and shallow waterbodies are scattered all over the upazila of
Dharmapsha, especially towards the middle, western, eastern, and south-eastern parts. In
1999, the deep waterbody covering area decreased from 33.28 sq km to 26.67 sq km, and
the shallow waterbodies covering area has increased from 34.36 sq. km to 50.56 sq km.
In the satellite image of 1999, it is demonstrated that here the north-eastern part is holds
most of the deep water bodies, some other parts of deep water bodies are scattered
towards the eastern and south-eastern part, and the shallow waterbody has had a further
development all over the area.
76 Azmery et al.
Fig. 2. Spatio-Temporal variation in Deep (a) and shallow (b) water bodies in
Dharmapasha Upazila.
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 77
Table 2. The areal extent of the shallow and deep-water bodies from 1989 to 2019.
Dharmapasha Tahirpur
Shallow water Deep water Shallow water Deep water
Year
(km2) (km2) (km2) (km2)
1989 34.36 33.28 8.70 63.86
1999 50.56 26.67 22.79 45.46
2009 74.65 30.02 37.81 35.97
2019 72.44 16.11 12.84 37.71
Source: Prepared from Landsat image analysis.
Generally, in the western and south-western parts, there is also a huge amount of shallow
waterbodies towards the eastern, central, and western parts. Afterward, in the year of
2009, both the deep and shallow water bodies increased to 30.02 and 74.65 km2,
respectively. Here the satellite image is inflating that further development of deep
waterbodies has occurred in some parts of north-eastern and eastern parts and the shallow
waterbody in the south-western parts of the study area. Then in 2019, a huge cut-off
occurred in the deep waterbody from 30.02 to 16.11, and the shallow water bodies
decreased to 72.44 km2. The satellite image also reflects fewer water bodies in the north-
eastern and eastern parts. Besides the shallow water bodies of the northern and south-
western parts are missing remarkably, and other area remains almost unchanged. Figure 3
demonstrates that the deep water bodies increased in 2009 and decreased gradually. The
shallow waterbodies are steadily following an upward trend in Dharmapasha Upazila.
Fig. 3. Temporal variations in the area extent of deep and shallow waterbodies in
Dharmapasha upazila between 1989 and 2019.
78 Azmery et al.
Changes of waterbodies in Tahirpur Upazila: Deep water bodies are mostly situated in
Tahirpur Upazila. Table 2 and Figs 4 (a and b) demonstrate that in 1989, the deep-water
bodies covered 63.86 km2 and shallow water 8.70 km2. The satellite image of 1989 of
Tahirpur Upazila shows that most of the deep waterbody is in the western, southern, and
in the central part of the area, and some shallow waterbodies can be seen sporadically all
over the area.
After one decade, in 1999, the deep waterbody dramatically decreased from 63.86 to
45.46 km2, and shallow water bodies increased from 8.70 to 22.79 km2. The satellite
image of 1999 reveals that most of the deep-water bodies are towards the western and
southern parts. Shallow water bodies have developed sporadically throughout the area,
especially towards the eastern and northern parts. In the year 2009, it is noticeable that
there was an intense cut-off in the area of deep water, from 45.46 to 35.97 km2, and a
little augmentation has occurred in the shallow water area from 22.79 to 37.81 km2. The
satellite image of 2009 shows the scenario that the maximum deep-water area is located
in the western and southern parts of the area. There are also some other parts towards the
central and northern part, and the shallow water satellite image shows that a dramatic
shift has occurred during this decade towards the eastern and south-eastern parts and
there is scattered shallow water all over the area. Here a little satisfactory indication is
that during the decade of 2019, further development has taken place from 35.97 to 37.71
km2. Figure 5 shows that the extent of the deep water body in Tahirpur Upazila decreased
from 1989 to 2009, and since 2009 remained stable until 2019. The shallow water bodies
have increased from 1989 to 2009, and since 2009 experienced a declining trend until
2019.
Conservation and management system: It has been observed from the study that local
people are still deprived of resource use. Approximately 90% of respondents (Fig. 6)
opined that influential local rich people, often political leaders fully maintained the study
area. The study demonstrated that over 85% of the respondents opined that the wetland
fishery resources of the study areas are still being controlled by local influence. Local
people alleged that they do not have access to the haor, and are treated in the same
manner as during leasing system.
Most respondents (78.67 per cent) believe that the government solely works in the study
area to construct submerged embankments cum roads to protect wetland resources (Fig.
7). Though desired by local people, permanent embankments are not constructed by the
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 79
Fig. 4. Spatio-Temporal variations in deep (a) and shallow (b) waterbodies in Tahirpur upazila.
80 Azmery et al.
Water Development Board (BWDB). Maintaining the embankments to protect crops
especially standing paddy, is a prime concern to the LGED and BWDB. NGOs
interventions are seldom observed in the study wetlands.
Fig. 5. Temporal variations in the areal extent of deep and shallow waterbodies in
Tahirpur upazila.
Fig. 6. Variations in stakeholders roles affected the number of respondents in
haor management.
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 81
Fig. 7. Relative positions of the initiatives taken to protect haor resources.
Conclusion
Wetlands of Tahirpur and Dhamapasha Upazilas are the sources of enormous natural
resources and provide various of ecological services, including offering excellent habitat
for migratory birds and local aquatic floral and faunal resources, retaining water to
protect against flash floods, etc. Mainly due to increasing unplanned interventions (rapid
population growth expansion to settlements and agricultural practices, illegal poaching,
etc.) and overexploitation of natural resources, the wetlands of Tahirpur and
Dharmapasha Upazilas of Sunamganj have been gradually degraded. The fishery
resources and fuel wood supply from the wetlands have seriously declined. In terms of
wetland areal extent, the study observed that from the period 1989 to 2019, deep water
(beels) at Tahirpur declined from 63.86 km2 to 37.71 km2, while some have declined
from 33.28 km2 to 16.11 km2 at Dharmapasha Upazila. In contrast, shallow water bodies
have dramatically increased in both the upazilas. The loss of deep water bodies has led to
the loss of immense aquatic resources. The deeper sections of the wetlands in the study
areas have been fragmented and converted into shallow water bodies. On the other hand,
natural resources, including indigenous waterfowl, fisheries, and migratory birds are
highly threatened even at Tanguar Haor, which is recognized as a Ramsar site at Tahirpur
Upazila. The current practices of beel management through cooperatives formed by the
82 Azmery et al.
beel user groups appeared to be more unsustainable. The effective implementation of the
existing government plans and policies (e.g., Haor Master Plan) ensures the wise use
principle is required to conserve the wetlands of the study areas. In addition, local
people’s awareness of the importance of the conservation of migratory bird stock, and
indigenous aquatic resources needs to be enhanced, and poverty eradication schemes
covering all the poor need to be strengthened. Effective training on fisheries, raring of
ducks, cattle, etc., has to be imparted to the local beel user groups and the hard-core poor
of the study areas.
References
Akhter, H., C. Mia and S.A. Panna. 2018. Understanding the Changes of the Wetland Ecosystem
and Its Impact on the Biodiversity of Tanguar Haor in Sunamganj, Bangladesh. Asian J.
Environ. Ecol. 7(4): 1-11.
Alam, A.B.M.S., M.K. Badhon, and M.W. Sarker 2015. Biodiversity of Tanguar Haor: a Ramsar
Site of Bangladesh Volume III: Fish. IUCN, International Union for Conservation of Nature.
Bangladesh Country Office, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Byomkesh, T., N. Nakagoshi and M.S. Rashid 2008. State and management of wetlands in
Bangladesh. Landsc. Ecol. Eng. 5(1): 81-70.
Chakraborty, T.R. 2009. Management of Haors, Baors, and Beels in Bangladesh. Less. Lake Basin
Manage. 1(15): 55.
Dugan, P.J. 1990. Wetland conservation: A review of current issues and requires action. IUCN,
Gland, Switzerland. p. 96
Erwin, K. L. 2009. Wetlands and global climate change: the role of wetland restoration in a
changing world. Wetlands Ecol. Manage. 17: 71-84.
Hulme, P. E. 2005. Adapting to climate change: is there scope for ecological management in the
face of a global threat? J. Appl. Ecol. 42: 784-794.
Islam, S. N. 2010. Threatened wetlands and ecologically sensitive ecosystems management in
Bangladesh. Front. Earth Sci. China 4(4): 438-448.
Monwar, M.M., M.G. Mustafa, N.A. Khan, M.S. Hossain, M.M. Hossain, M.K. Mojumder, R.M.
Chowdhury, M.A. Islam, M. Chowdhury and M.S. Alam. 2018. Indigenous adaptation
practices for the development of climate resilient ecosystems in the Hail haor, Bangladesh.
Glob. Soc. Welf. 5(2): 125-136.
O’Connell, M. J. 2003. Detecting, measuring and reversing changes to wetlands. Wetl. Ecol.
Manag. 11(6): 397-401.
Ramsar Convention Bureau. 1971. Convention on wetlands of international importance, especially
as waterfowl habitat, Ramsar, Iran. Ramsar Convention Bureau. Ramsar Convention on
Wetlands. Ramsar Convention Bureau, Rue Mauverney, Gland, Switzerland.
Wetland degradation and conservation of natural resources 83
Rahman, A.A., S. Huq, A. Reddy, M. Alam, and S.A. Kabir. 2001. Bangladesh: State of the
Environment 2001. United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP).
Rahman, M., S. Halder, and D. Capistrano. 1996. Community-based wetland habitat restoration and
management: Experiences and insights from Bangladesh. Paper presented at the Sixth Annual
Conference of the International Association for the Study of Common Property, 5-8 June,
Berkeley, California, USA.
Tockner, K. and J.A. Stanford. 2002. Riverine flood plains: Present state and future trends.
Environ. Conserv. 29: 308-330.
Williams, W.D. 2002. Community participation in conserving and managing inland waters. Aquat.
Conserv.: Mar. Freshw. Ecosyst. 12(3): 315-326.
(Revised copy received on 07.05.2023)
