Hi everyone! In today’s second post of the week, I will be summarizing the work I found by 5 groups of researchers.
The first paper I found was by Hasan et al. (2019), who explained the issues of water pollution. Bangladesh is actually home to many water sources in Asia. Unfortunately, many of them are polluted with toxic trace metals, coliforms, and other (in)organic pollutants. Groundwater sources in Bangladesh are also polluted with arsenic. This is caused by agricultural runoffs, improper disposal of domestic waste, and untreated industrial effluents. The image below was extracted from their paper. Look at how much dangerous bacteria is water that is deemed drinkable in Bangladesh!
To better visualize how terrible the situation is, you can also take a look at this video showing how polluted the rivers in Dhaka are.
The other paper I found was by Kibria et al. (2016). They examined metal pollution in Bangladesh’s waterways, and found that 8 heavy metals were present on a regular basis in various waterways in Chittagong, Dhaka, and Khulna. They include Cd, Cu, Fe, Mn, Ni, Pb, U, and Zn. They suggested that effluents from tanneries, textiles, agriculture, fish farming, and ship breaking are most likely the reasons why heavy metals are heavily concentrated in these rivers. This is unfortunate, and as mentioned by Kibria et al., Bangladesh is suffering from poor water quality for irrigation and drinking, food contamination and insecurity due to the bioaccumulation of metals in crops and seafood, and health impacts. As such, they suggest that there is a need for better application of regulations and rules, specifically the “polluter pays principle” where parties who pollute have to be liable for the damage they cause to society and the environment. They also call out other scholars to continue monitoring metal concentrations in ecologically critical wetlands.
Apart from these 2 papers, I found 3 papers that focus on how Bangladesh can move forward. In Hoque & Clarke’s (2013) paper, I learnt that there have been pollution prevention activities and initiatives that were developed in Bangladesh. The only problem was that many companies and stakeholders do not utilize them well enough (they have ample room to improve). In Karim et al.’s (2019) paper, I learnt that it is difficult to manage microplastics pollution, because it is hard to manage the indiscriminate use of plastic materials in our daily lives. There is also a limited number of strategies for microplastics cleanup. However, they do suggest some avenues to work on. You can refer to page 89 for this. Finally, in Thornburg’s (2022) paper, I discovered an initiative to help pregnant women deal with indoor air pollution. It is quite a complicated study, but to sum up, they had women try on this MicroPEM to better understand how polluted their surroundings were. From there, they gave some brief comments. I personally found it upsetting that a lot of these scholars report their findings without suggesting how to manage the polluted circumstances people live in. Regardless, I look forward to learning more on how to manage with these polluted scenarios in the upcoming weeks.
P.S: some trivia for you! If you click on the link that directs you to Karim et al.’s paper, you will be able to compare primary and secondary microplastics. According to them, the former are plastic fragments that are smaller than 5mm before entering the environment, and the latter are derived from the breakdown of larger plastic debris, caused by wave action, ultraviolet radiation, or other physical, chemical, and biological processes!
Up next, Bolivia. See you in the next one! ✿
References
Al Jazeera English (2020) Bangladesh factories ordered shut to save Dhaka’s river. 23 February. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NIXtnD-Y98 [Accessed: 28 January 2022].
Hasan, M. K., Shahriar, A. & Jim, K. U. (2019) Water Pollution in Bangladesh and its Impact on Public Health. Heliyon. 5(8), 1-23. Available from: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S2405844019358050?via%3Dihub [Accessed: 28 January 2022].
Hoque, A. & Clarke, A. (2013) Greening of Industries in Bangladesh: Pollution Prevention Practices. Journal of Cleaner Production. 51, 47-56. Available from: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S0959652612004738?via%3Dihub [Accessed: 28 January 2022].
Karim, M. E., Sanjee, S. A., Mahmud, S., Shaha, M., Moniruzzaman, M. & Das, K. C. (2019) Microplastics Pollution in Bangladesh: Current Scenario and Future Research Perspective. Chemistry and Ecology. 36(1), 83-99. Available from: https://www-tandfonline-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/doi/full/10.1080/02757540.2019.1688309 [Accessed: 28 January 2022].
Kibria, G., Hossain, M. H., Mallick, D., Lau, T. C. & Wu, R. (2016) Monitoring of Metal Pollution in Waterways Across Bangladesh and Ecological and Public Health Implications of Pollution. Chemosphere. 165, 1-9. Available from: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S0045653516311560?via%3Dihub [Accessed: 28 January 2022].
Thornburg, J., Islam, S., Billah, S. M., Chan, B., McCombs, M., Abbott, M., Alam, A. & Raynes-Greenow, C. (2022) Pregnant Women’s Exposure to Household Air Pollution in Rural Bangladesh: A Feasibility Study for Poriborton: The CHANge Trail. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 19(1), 1-13. Available from: https://www-ncbi-nlm-nih-gov.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/pmc/articles/PMC8744871/ [Accessed: 28 January 2022].