The Hindu : National : Sunderbans under threat

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Sunday, Jun 06, 2004

National

National

Sunderbans under threat

A MESSAGE ON ENVIRONMENT DAY: A group of Greater Adjutant storks look for food in a polluted wetland area in Guwahati. Lack of proper garbage dumping facilities in the city is endangering the environment as well as wildlife. — Photo: Ritu Raj Konwar

KOLKATA, JUNE 5. Severe environmental threats such as rise in the sea level and sea surface temperature, and land erosion could render about 30,000 people in the Sunderbans homeless in the islands of the world's largest delta by 2020.

Disclosing this here on Friday, the director of the School of Oceanography, Saugata Hazra, said: ``About four lakh people are already affected in the past few years and more than 600 families have migrated to other islands due to erosion and coastal flooding, while crops and property worth Rs. 950 million have been damaged.''

``We have done a study based on the GIS model about the environmental situation in the Sunderbans. The sea level is rising there relatively at 3.14 mm per annum and the sea surface temperature is rising by .019 degrees Centigrade.

"Combined with this is the severe land erosion in most of the islands from the south,'' Dr. Hazra told UNI on the sidelines of a seminar organised by the American Centre and the Kolkata Port Trust to commemorate the World Environment Day which falls today. He said strong storms have been lashing the mangrove reserve and damaging the islands.

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