Ahmedabad: Wetlands designated as national interests, and the Ramsar website, Nalsarovar, on the outskirts of Ahmedabad, are also the most polluted, according to the Gujarat Forestry Department.
In the report prepared for the Fund of the International Cooperation Agency of the Rs 905 Crore (JICA) for ecosystem restoration, the department stated that the Nalsarovar website was the most important, and the worst due to hunting and suffering from high invasive species attacks.
In a survey conducted between the end of 2019 and the early 2020 Ministry of Forestry has claimed that on the scale of the index 1 to 5, where 1 is the lowest, Nalsarovar scores ‘5’ for pollution, hunting and scores ‘4’ for infestation by Invasive Flora Species .
In his report, the department claimed that Nalsarovar suffered a large management problem that included, “Terrestrialization, higher anthropogenic pressure – Pollution, hunting, fishing – and higher local community dependence on natural resources.” One of the five most vulnerable tribal communities of the state – ‘Padhar’ – live in Peripheral Nalarovar villages and they are very dependent on Nalsarovar’s resources for their daily livelihoods.
Apart from this, Ramsar’s wetlands also faced major problems, and challenges for management including waste, the growth of reeds and uncontrolled weeds, prosopis growth of Juliflora on the edge of wetlands, the hunt for funds, effective fund management for effective management site.
While maintaining the importance of Nalsarovar’s website, the report claimed “Gujarat was part of the Central Asian fly from migration birds which were mostly caused by a large number of wetlands.
Nalsarovar, Khijadiya, Porbandar, Marine National Park, Marine Wildlife Sanctuary, wild sanctuary butt, Kutch Desert Sanctuary and Chari Dhak Cagar Caservation are wetlands notified as right.
Eight wetlands of the state is recognized as an important wetland nationally, “said the report.