Chilika Lake gets ‘B’ again on ecological health report card

March 23, 2016 12:00 am | Updated 05:51 am IST - BHUBANESWAR:

Despite huge pressure of overfishing, unregulated tourism, and sedimentation, Chilika Lake, Asia’s largest brackish water lagoon, has managed to retain its ecological health.

The second eco-system health report card of Chilika based compilation of complex volume of data and information gathered through the lake monitoring programme in 2014 says overall score of lagoon’s health was B as was reported in 2012. The lagoon’s health report was released on occasion of celebration of World Forestry Day here on Monday.

Eco-system health of Chilika Lake was assessed by taking into consideration 10 indicators. “During 2012, the overall score was ‘B’ which is the same as reported here for 2014. Individual indicators also showed similar grades except chlorophyll-a, which was used for the first time in this report card, instead of total chlorophyll in 2012,” says the report card.

Similarly, the northern zone obtained the score ‘B-’ which was also B in 2012. “This zone displayed excellent results for fisheries, mix of good and poor level of water quality and good biodiversity (with the exception of dolphin sightings) during the year 2014,” said Ajit Pattnaik, Chief Executive of Chilika Development Authority.

“Southern zone which was B during 2012, scored B+ during 2014 due to excellent results for fisheries, good water quality (with the exception of chlorophyll) and good biodiversity highlighted by phyto, benthos and dolphin abundance,” he said.

The central and outer channel zone obtained the same score as in 2012.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.