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Restoring water sources priority
KATHMANDU, AUG 21 -
More than two dozen organisations have spent millions of rupees on the pretext of conserving the Bagmati in the past decade but the state of the river is as sorry as ever. Officials involved in the campaign admit the programmes have not been able to do anything worthwhile except generating public awareness on the need to conserve the biologically dead river.
Around 31 organisations have been working on Bagmati conservation, particularly in the sectors of awareness, plantation and clean-ups, but there has been no headway in addressing the increasing pollution, encroachment of banks and its flood plains, acute water shortage and deterioration of the cultural heritage. The environmental and cultural degradation of the Bagmati river system has continued unabated in the lack of an integrated approach by the stakeholders, said Siddh-artha Ratna Bajracharya, executive officer of the National Trust for Nature Conservation (NTNC).
Meanwhile, with a view to conserving and restoring the river and its tributaries in an integrated and coordinated approach, the government has come up with a 15-billion-rupee five-year Bagmati Action Plan (BAP) envisaged to be completed by 2014. An NTNC project, the BAP was endorsed by the government last August. Among the major objectives of the plan are immediate restoration and conservation of the river ecosystem including replenishment of water resources.
According to environmentalist and BAP advisory committee member Bhusan Tuladhar, along with management of waste—arguably the biggest challenge for the Capital, the plan intends to work on the restoration of water charging zones by afforestation and low check dams in the sources of rivulets in the Valley.
The river system in the Kathmandu valley is divided into five zones including the natural conservation core zone, urban zone and downstream zone. Zone 1 consists of green hills surrounding the valley. The BAP has identified 34 ponds here for rehabilitation with plans to promote rainwater harvesting in a number of households.
Posted on: 2010-08-22 08:58
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