BANGKOK (Reuters) – Unsustainable development is threatening the health and diverse fish populations of the Mekong river, with one-fifth of fish species in Southeast Asia’s main artery facing extinction, a group report said. of conservation on Monday.
The Mekong, which stretches nearly 5,000 km (3,000 miles) from the Tibetan Plateau to the South China Sea, is a farming and fishing line for tens of millions of people in China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.
Threats to its fish include habitat loss, conversion of wetlands for agriculture and aquaculture, unsustainable sand mining, introduction of invasive species, worsening climate change and hydropower dams that block the flow of the river and its tributaries, according to in a report compiled by the World Wildlife Fund and 25 global marine and wildlife conservation groups.
“The biggest threat right now, and a threat that is potentially still gaining momentum, is hydropower development,” said fish biologist Zeb Hogan, who heads Wonders of the Mekong, one of the groups behind the report. .
Dams alter the flow of the world’s third most biodiverse river, altering water quality and blocking fish migration, he said.
A growing number of Chinese-built hydroelectric dams upstream have blocked much of the sediment that supplies vital nutrients to thousands of farms in the Mekong River Delta, Reuters reported in 2022.
About 19% of the Mekong’s 1,148 or so fish species are headed for extinction, the conservationists’ report, “The Mekong’s Forgotten Fishes”, said, adding that the number could be higher because too little is known about 38 % of species to measure their conservation status.
Among those facing extinction are 18 species listed as “critically endangered” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, including two of the world’s largest catfish, the world’s largest carp and the giant freshwater stingray.
“Some of the largest and rarest fish… anywhere in the world occur in the Mekong River,” Hogan said.
Depletion of fish in the Mekong – which accounts for more than 15% of the world’s inland catch, bringing in more than $11 billion annually – could harm food security for at least 40 million people in the Lower Mekong livelihoods may depend on the river, the report said.
Hogan said it’s “not too late” for delta nations to coordinate efforts to reverse the adverse effects on fish populations.
“If we act, act together, to develop the river firmly, there is still hope,” he said.
(Reporting by Juarawee Kittisilpa: Writing by Panu Wongcha-um; Editing by William Mallard)
