Unplanned mangrove afforestation spelling doom for Sunderbans' green cover

The dense mangrove forests of the world’s largest delta region truly act as a buffer to all major cyclonic storms that form in the Bay of Bengal and hit the Bengal coast, thus protecting Kolkata. But the 'over ambitious' project of Mamata Banerjee envisaging planting 50 million trees is causing more damage than good, according to environmentalists.

Kolkata: What saves Kolkata and its hinterland time and again during every major cyclone? The Sunderbans.

The dense mangrove forests of the world’s largest delta region truly act as a buffer to all major cyclonic storms that form in the Bay of Bengal and hit the Bengal coast. Had the mangrove forests not been there, environmentalists have time and again said, the cyclones with some amount of severity would have battered Kolkata and its adjoining areas, time and again.

But, the fragile delta region has been under threat for some time now and subsequent dispensations have not taken matters seriously enough. The result, the scale of devastation during last year’s very severe cyclonic storm Amphan was telling on Kolkata. Interestingly, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had inaugurated an ambitious plan to plant 50 million mangrove plants after the devastation caused to the delta region, post-cyclone Amphan in 2020. But, many environmentalists had simply said the plan was ‘over ambitious’.

A simple calculation suggests that the Chief Minister’s plans were really over-ambitious. Experts say around 5,000 mangroves can be planted on one hectare of land and that is an outside limit. And with that outstretched limit, to plant 50 million plants, around 10,000 hectares of land or a little over 100 sq km would have been required. Roughly put, that is approximately half of the size of Kolkata city.

“It was an impractical decision to plant such a large number of trees in one go. Planting of mangroves in the chars (silted islands) as well as along the meandering rivers in the delta region requires special skills. It is only space, but the tidal rivers and rivulets change the soil support system everyday. Salinity factors and wind patterns have to be taken into account before any afforestation in the Sunderbans. Mere planning a large volume of trees will never solve the problem,” said a Kolkata-based environmentalist.

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The experts’ cautions have proved right. Whatever mangrove afforestation was done after Amphan has been literally wiped out after this year’s cyclone Yaas. Though the ferocity of Yaas was much less in comparison to Amphan, yet most of the newly planted mangrove plants have simply been blown off.

The Sunderbans on the Indian side is spread over an estimated 9,630 sq km, out of which around 5,400 sq km has human habitation. The rest is a forest area, a bio-diversity site. Incidentally, several local conservationists have been repeatedly raising flags and warning the government that a section of villagers was illegally felling mangrove trees with active support from a section of politicians, but no heed was paid to those warnings. Yet again, the results have been telling.

The cyclone Amphan-battered Sunderbans have been literally left in tatters by cyclone Yaas. The damage is huge to property as well as to the forest area.

With yet again another World Environment Day with the theme of environment protection, Sunderbans experts say the time has come to take concrete and biologically informed decisions to plant new mangroves, to nurture them and protect them. “Or else, another cyclone will only decrease the buffer that protects the Kolkata metropolis,” they say.

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