The Impact of Aquatic Salinization on Fish Habitats and Poor Communities in a Changing Climate: Evidence from Southwest Coastal Bangladesh

Susmita Dasgupta, Mainul Huq, Md. Golam Mustafa, Md. Istiak Sobhan and David Wheeler

Ecological Economics, 2017, vol. 139, issue C, 128-139

Abstract: Fisheries constitute an important source of livelihoods for tens of thousands of poor people in the southwest coastal region of Bangladesh, and they supply a significant portion of protein for millions. Among the various threats fisheries in the southwest coastal region will face because of climate change, adverse impacts from increased aquatic salinity caused by sea level rise will be one of the greatest challenges. This paper investigates possible impacts of climate change on aquatic salinity, fish species habitats, and poor communities using the salinity tolerance ranges of 83 fish species consumed in the region and aquatic salinity in 27 alternative scenarios of climate change in 2050. The results provide striking evidence that projected aquatic salinization may have an especially negative impact on poor households in the region. The estimates indicate that areas with poor populations that lose species are about six times more prevalent than areas gaining species.

Keywords: Climate change; Aquatic salinization; Fish habitats; Poverty; Bangladesh (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q22 Q25 Q54 Q57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800916312137
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:139:y:2017:i:c:p:128-139

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2017.04.009

Access Statistics for this article

Ecological Economics is currently edited by C. J. Cleveland

More articles in Ecological Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().