Bangladeshis Eye Ocean's Edge - Rising Waters, Dying Dolphins, Turtles - Reuters

[hatrack]

Local council chairman Moulvi Feroze Ahmed doesn't know much about global warming or scientists' dire predictions for the fate of low-lying Bangladesh. But he fears for the future and the livelihoods of thousands of people on Bangladesh's only coral island. "No one has ever told my people what awaits them in 50 years or a century," Feroze said on Friday, hours before a UN climate panel released a report issuing the strongest warning yet that human activities are heating the planet.

"But I have seen the island gradually reduced to a size of 8 sq-km (3 sq miles) now from 12 sq-km 20 years ago," he told Reuters from Saint Martin's in the Bay of Bengal off the country's southernmost tip of Teknaf. "The corals are being eroded, land being squeezed. This is what we see ... and wonder why the Bay that gives us fish and a secure living is becoming cruel," Feroze, 55, said. "Recently, various sea species including turtles and dolphins are dying along our shores. But we don't know why."

EDIT

In Barisal, on Bangladesh's southwest coast, fishermen said the sea had become more erratic in recent years. "We had at least 10 storms in the Bay in the past year (2006), with more ferocity and loss of lives," said Moslem Miah, 62. "I have been fishing since my boyhood. Our main catch has been the Hilsha fish. But no longer they fill our nets like before. Where have they gone?"

Quamrul Islam Chowdhury, chairman of the Forum of Environmental Journalists of Bangladesh, said salt water would also leach into large areas along mainland Bangladesh, damaging agriculture. "The Sundarbans, the world's largest mangrove forest, will also be affected in case of sea level rise, sending in more saline water," he told Reuters. "The Bangladesh government has prepared a national plan of action to face the impact of climate change but it has yet to receive any global financial support," Chowdhury added.

EDIT

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/40157/story.htm

[kestrel91316]

1. Don't know why he's got his knickers in a twist. It's all just a myth.

He needs to go get a REAL job in the new economy. We can retrain him, right? Then he can consume and spend and be like the rest of us clueless humanoids.

[NNadir]

2. Submerging all of Bangladesh could never be as bad as a leak

in a nuclear reactor anywhere in the world.

The indifference to this kind of shit is simply stunning.

Let's found a website devoted to sequestering coal formed carbon dioxide and promising new wind mills by 2050. This will certainly make us all feel better about the matter.

[kestrel91316]

3. This is the last straw. You have earned the IGNORE button.

[NNadir]

4. Oh good.

An excellent way to avoid things is to ignore them.