BANGLADESH: Decades-old water dispute could destroy nation’s agriculture
DHAKA, 20 September 2010 (IRIN): Ongoing wrangling over vital waterways that pass through China and India – the two most populous countries in the world – could lead to agricultural devastation further downstream in Bangladesh, experts warn.
The Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers – together one of the largest freshwater flows in the world – pass through Bangladesh on their way to the ocean, but the rivers’ catchments (afvandingsområder) are outside the country, leaving the impoverished nation to rely on neighbours to allow water through.
However, with neighbours under pressure from population and economic growth looking to their own water and hydro-energy needs, Bangladesh is suffering.
As climate change increases Himalayan glacier melt and swells rivers below, China and India are likely to move forward with more dam projects, said Steve Luby of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh.
– The loss of the Himalayan ice pack means China and India are going ahead with plans to dam, and decrease water supply to Bangladesh, Luby said, adding:
– That puts a country that is already vulnerable in a worse position. In Bangladesh, more than 80 percent of the water used is used in agriculture.
Bangladesh first felt the impact of disrupted flow from the Ganges in 1975 when India built the Farakka barrage (dæmningsværk), which led to an almost 50 percent drop in dry season flow.
Now India, with a population of 1,1 billion that is expected to swell to more than 1,5 billion in the next four decades, plans to construct another large dam that will block a significant portion of downstream flow from the Meghna.
On top of that, China with plans to divert water for its own use from the Brahmaputra, which accounts for 71 percent of the water in the Ganges delta, said Ahsan Uddin Ahmed, of the Ministry of Water Resources.
– If somebody diverts the main flow and takes the water away, then a major ecological catastrophe will take place in this delta, said Ahmed, who is executive director of the centre for global change in the ministry’s Water Resources Planning Organization (WARPO). – It will have a tremendous adverse implication on Bangladesh, noted he.
According to World Bank and UN estimates, China’s population of more than 1,3 billion is expected to grow by about 70 million by 2050. While its projected population growth rate is lower than India’s, its GDP has skyrocketed at 10 percent or more annually over much of the past two decades.
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