Economic valuation of provisioning and cultural services of a protected mangrove ecosystem: A case study on Sundarbans Reserve Forest, Bangladesh

Environmental Impact of Coal based Power Plant of Rampal on the Sundarbans (World Largest Mangrove Forest) and Surrounding Areas

“…More than 500 thousand peoples are directly and indirectly depending on the Sundarbans for their livelihoods as well as socio-economic purposes. Around 200 thousand people go to the Sundarbans regularly to collect the resources for their livelihoods; less than 200 thousand collect the resources seasonally and around 100 thousand people are doing business of the collected resources and they never go to the Sundarbans directly for resources extraction; roughly 22% people's livelihoods are involved with the collection of wood resources; 5% are involved with the non-timber forest product; 69% are involved with the aquatic resources and 4% are involved with other purposes [10,11] Government has acquired 1,834 acres of agriculture land in Satmari-Katakhali and Koigordashkathi areas under Rampal upazila to establish the power plant. Only 86 acres lands are kash land and rest of the lands are public lands which were used for rice and fish cultivations by the land owners.…”

Assessing wetland services for improved development decision-making: a case study of mangroves in coastal Bangladesh

“…For comparison purpose, all estimated values were standardized to the year of 2015 using the consumer price index (CPI) calculator from the Bureau of Labour Statistics of the United States Department of Labour. In comparison with the estimated annual revenue of US$ 1.26 per ha collected by the Forest Department of Bangladesh as fees for harvesting mangroves products (including timber, firewood, fish, honey) in Sundarban (Uddin et al 2013a), the standardised annual economic value of mangroves products to local communities was estimated at US$ 116 per ha in Thailand (Sathirathai and Barbier 2001), and US$ 48 per ha in Indonesia (Malik et al 2015). Value per household of mangrove products estimated in the Bhitarkonika Conservation Area in India was almost US$ 115 (Hussain and Badola 2010).…”

“…While the mangroves are internationally renowned for conservation value, quantifying the ecosystem services of mangroves and their economic value provide a sound rationale for conservation supporting international or national policy commitments and preservation of biodiversity (Badola and Hussain 2005; UNEP/CBD 2010; Uddin et al 2013a;Haque and Aich 2014;DoE 2016).…”

“…Previous studies have documented the status and use of ecosystem services provided by Sundarban mangroves (Islam and Wahab 2005;Biswas et al 2007;Hoq 2007;Iftekhar 2008;Getzner and Islam 2013), but few have quantified those services and estimated their monetary value (Brander et al 2012;Uddin et al 2013a;Haque and Aich 2014). There is a crucial gap in understanding how the Sundarban ecosystem supports the local and regional economy, to what extent the policy dialogue can be strengthened, and how is the awareness of local communities who depend on the wetlands.…”

“…Sundarban has a rich biodiversity, and provides a range of provisioning services of food, timber, and other raw materials; regulating services of storm protection, erosion control and carbon sequestration; cultural services supporting tourism and recognised heritage; and supporting habitats important for local fishery and as nursery grounds for offshore ones (Islam and Wahab 2005;Biswas et al 2007;Hoq 2007;Iftekhar 2008;Iftekhar and Takama 2008;Getzner and Islam 2013;Uddin et al 2013a). Because of their strategic importance, the Sundarban mangrove was declared a forest reserve in 1878 under the Forest Act of 1865.…”