Economic Feasibility of Willow Removal from Wular Lake, Jammu and Kashmir, India Final Report Project Team Rahul Kaul, Ather Masoodi, Ajaz Rasool, MN Murty and J Kishwan Economic feasibility of Willow removal from Wular Lake Jammu and Kashmir Submitted to: GIZ/Ministry of Environment & Forests Government of India Submitted by: Wildlife Trust of India Economic feasibility of Willow removal from Wular Lake, Jammu and Kashmir Contents Acknowledgements…………………………………………………..4 Executive Summary…………………………………………………..5 Background………………………………………………………………7 Wular – a Profile……………………………………………………..16 Methods………………………………………………………………….50 Cost-Benefit Analysis………………………………………………..55 References………………………………………………………………72 Appendices………………………………………………………………74 Acknowledgements We are thankful to many government departments who supported by providing data which was critical in doing this study. These include departments of revenue, fisheries, tourism, wildlife protection, irrigation and flood control and forests. A special thanks to Mr Rashid Naqash at WUCUMA for all his support. Thankful to Mr Intesar Suhail (wildlife warden), Dr. Riyaz Ahmad and Mr Shams for accompanying us to undertake survey of birds. We are thankful to the local communities who responded to our questionnaire surveys and shared their experiences and long term understanding of the resource linkages. We extend our sincere gratitude to Shoaib Ahmad Dar, Ghulam Hassan, Hilal Ahmad and Firdous Ahmad for undertaking the questionnaire surveys. Finally, thanks to Ministry of Environment and Forests/GIZ for provided funding for this project. We express thanks to the team of experts who were involved in this project including Dr Ritesh Kumar of Wetland International with whom we had initial discussions. Thanks to members of the STAG committee of TEEB India for providing inputs at various stages of the project, especially Dr. Gopal Kadekodi who reviewed an earlier draft of this report. Executive Summary Wular lake is a shallow, high altitude lake. With an area of 130 km 2 it is the largest fresh water lake in India. Wular is intricately linked with the hydrological regime of the valley since all water draining the valley upstream of the lake via River Jhelum has to pass through it. Along with its associated marshes, it played the function of water regulation, absorbing water during peak flows and discharging this excess water in lean times. The lake was listed as a Ramsar site in 1992 for the congregation of bird species, especially the migratory waterfowl in winter. The lake has shrunk in size from 213 km 2 in 1911 to 130 km 2, almost by half. This shrinkage has been attributed to drainage of the associated marshes, siltation and subsequent plantation of willows since 1912 to supply the fuelwood needs of the local people. The changes in the lake character have adversely affected the lake function and in a bid to restore it, the state government had a plan formulated by Wetlands International in 2007. This holistic plan recommends setting up of a Wular Authority under the Department of Wildlife Protection. This authority would implement and monitor other actions suggested which included augmentation of lake capacity by dredging and excavation at specified points subsequent to removal of willows along with their rootstock. The plan also recommended catchment area treatments to reduce siltation rates, especially in the immediate catchment of Madhumati and Erin rivers and enhancement of livelihoods with emphasis being laid on development of tourism. This plan was not implemented and instead, a whittled down version was accepted in the form of a Revised Action Plan which reduced the scope of work significantly. Under this plan, the main activities were to remove willows from an area of 7.4 km 2 and excavation, dredging of over 2 million cubic meters of silt. Apprehensions have been expressed on the various detrimental impacts of such activities. Among them have been ecological impacts, impairing ecological function and affecting in the long term, the food chain and perhaps the livelihood of people which largely comes from fish and vegetable based product harvests. Doubts have also been expressed about whether removal of willows would increase suspended particulate matter and silt since willow roots are known to bind loose particles. Removal of trees would also mean a permanent loss of carbon dioxide sequestration potential. Removal of trees could also cause losses to biodiversity, and being a Ramsar site, avifauna is quite an important component of the lake. On the positive side, the activities would help to increase volumetric capacity thus helping in better water regulation since more water would be available, better flood control since waters flowing through various rivers and channels bring higher flows during such times and the lake needs to have higher absorption capacity. The increased water availability would also potentially lead to higher availability of water during lean seasons for the three downstream power stations and higher power generation. The plan suggested thus has both, costs and benefits. Therefore, we undertook a cost benefit analysis of the revised plan to assess if it made economic sense to remove the willows from the lake. We assessed costs and benefit flows through four categories of stakeholders – government, public, individuals and business and industry. Most data were obtained from government departments. However some data collection for bird richness was carried out. We also undertook questionnaire surveys to produce information on incomes generated by locals from fishing and harvesting of vegetation products like traps and nelumbo. We also evaluated the travel costs for tourists visiting Wular. We have left out the ecological services from the analysis since we were not able to calculate the costs and benefits at that level. The results indicate overwhelming economic benefits of the plan in terms of costs saved on flood damage, increase in power generation, improvement in livelihoods by more fish and trapa becoming available and the onetime gain from the sale of willow. On the costs, the main costs come from loss of sequestration benefits and dredging. We are unable to assess how the activity would impact siltation rates since removal of willows allows for free silt particles to float in the water which may settle down where flows are reduced. However, removal of willows is also expected to improve flows to carry higher silt loads into the river on its exit. The main suggestion from the report is that the activities stipulated in the report must be carried out in a timely fashion and continued even beyond. However, monitoring of ecological processes is important and emphasis must be laid on developing a strong scientific monitoring protocol which could be outsourced to a local research organisation with specific terms of reference. Willow clearance will open up a significant area and the possibility of invasive species colonising such areas is high. Species like Azolla and the alligator weed have already been reported from the lake and its advance must be monitored closely and thwarted. The study also found negligible tourism activity and ways to improve tourism must be found which would have a compounding affect on the importance of the lake and thus its maintenance. Background Wular is a shallow lake, (5.8m: Max. depth), situated about 40 km northwest of the capital city of Srinagar (34 o 20’ N; 70 o 42’ E) in the State of Jammu and Kashmir, India. Its expanse of nearly 130-189 km 2at an altitude of 1,530 m makes it amongst the largest high altitude fresh water lakes in Asia and certainly the largest fresh water lake in India. It is about 16 km long and 7.6 km wide. The Valley of Kashmir, within which the lake is located, is surrounded by high mountain ranges. Therefore the watersheds drain into the valley, which is sloping from south to north with a mean altitude of about 1,700 m (in Srinagar). The Jhelum river, which is the main river flowing through and across the valley has its origins in Verinag, a spring in the south and from which the Jhelum, fed by a host of perennial streams, flows into the Wular from the south eastern side and after making U pin exits the lake, flowing down Baramulla and eventually through Pakistan to fall into the Indus. Thus, most of the water that the valley receives passes through the Wular Lake. Fig. 1.1: Location of Wular Lake The catchments of Wular Lake are essentially linked with the entire Jhelum Basin, which extends to an area of 12,777 km 2 comprising 24 watersheds (Wetland International 2007). The basin can be broadly classified into following three sub catchments: • Wular upstream sub catchment comprising 14 watersheds of River Jhelum prior to its entry into Wular, extending to 8,627 km 2. • Wular direct sub catchment comprising 6 watersheds directly draining into Wular extending to 1,144 km 2. • Wular downstream sub catchment comprising 3 watersheds of River Jhelum below Wular extending to 3,006 km 2. Therefore, Wular and its associated marshes and wetlands, has been performing a significant function of regulating water regime in the valley by absorbing water ¡ during peak periods (summers) and releasing it during lows (winters). This regulation also helps in flood control by absorbing excess water and preventing fast run offs. This role has been recognized since the historical times and thus the lake has been subjected to periodic interventions. Wular also contributes immensely to the local economies. Over 60% of fish for the Kashmir valley comes from the Wular and this supports about 8000 fisher families. Besides, Wular provides two important plant resources impacting local economy – the water chestnut, (Trapa sp.) and the lotus root ( Nelumbo sp .), consumed by the denizens of the valley with cherish through the winters. Though the lake has potential for tourism, this has really not taken off, possibly due to its distance from Srinagar and also its appeal, infrastructure and projection.