Arsenic concentrations in rice, vegetables, and fish in Bangladesh: a preliminary study

Arsenic contaminating groundwater in Bangladesh is one of the largest environmental health hazards in the world. Because of the potential risk to human health through consumption of agricultural produce grown in fields irrigated with arsenic contaminated water, we have determined the level of contamination in 100 samples of crop, vegetables and fresh water fish collected from three different regions in Bangladesh. Arsenic concentrations were determined by hydride generation atomic absorption spectrophotometry. All 11 samples of water and 18 samples of soil exceeded the expected limits of arsenic. No samples of rice grain (Oryza sativa L.) had arsenic concentrations more than the recommended limit of 1.0 mg/kg. However, rice plants, especially the roots had a significantly higher concentration of arsenic (2.4 mg/kg) compared to stem (0.73 mg/kg) and rice grains (0.14 mg/kg). Arsenic contents of vegetables varied; those exceeding the food safety limits included Kachu sak (Colocasia antiquorum) (0.09-3.99 mg/kg, n=9), potatoes (Solanum tuberisum) (0.07-1.36 mg/kg, n=5), and Kalmi sak (Ipomoea reptoms) (0.1-1.53 mg/kg, n=6). Lata fish (Ophicephalus punctatus) did not contain unacceptable levels of arsenic. These results indicate that arsenic contaminates some food items in Bangladesh. Further studies with larger samples are needed to demonstrate the extent of arsenic contamination of food in Bangladesh.     

Urban earthquake hazard: perceived seismic risk and preparedness in Dhaka City,Bangladesh

Bangladesh is vulnerable to seismic events. Experts suspect that if an earthquake with a 7.0 magnitude occurred in large cities of Bangladesh, there would be a major human tragedy due to the structural failure of many buildings. The primary objectives of this paper are to examine seismic risk perception among residents of Dhaka City and investigate their levels of earthquake preparedness. A questionnaire survey conducted among 444 residents of the city provided the major source of data for the paper. The survey results suggest that an overwhelming majority of the respondents were not prepared for a major earthquake, which is anticipated to occur in Dhaka. Multivariate analysis of survey data reveals that value of residential unit and respondent educational levels appear as the most significant determinants of preparedness status of the respondents. This study recommends increasing earthquake awareness and preparedness among residents of Dhaka City.     

Adaptation to climate change as resilience for urban extreme poor: lessons learned from targeted asset transfers programmes in Dhaka city of Bangladesh

This paper aims to identify how targeted asset transfers help to build adaptive capacity and adaptive actions of the urban extreme poor to climate change phenomena. This paper explores the theoretical debates of community-based adaptation approach and failure of such approach to address urban extreme poor. The empirical evidence of these theoretical debates will be drawn from two informal settlements of Dhaka city, where a targeted asset transfer project has been implementing since 2009. This paper explains that urban extreme poor usually work as unskilled labour and lack different livelihood capitals; and climate change is an increasingly important influence exacerbating an already vulnerable livelihood context. There is growing recognition in the literature that poor urban people and communities are adapting to climate change in physical and behavioural terms. But, in the case of urban extreme poor these adaptation approaches are delivering short-term survival strategies disregarding the notion of wellbeing in the medium to long-term perspectives. It is also evident that community level initiatives structurally reproduce the exclusion of the urban extreme poor. However, poverty literatures acknowledge that poverty-centred approaches could help to reduce vulnerability. As urban extreme poor are significantly more resource constrained, it is reasonable to assert that targeted asset transfers could be a poverty-centred adaptation approach in a changing climate. Targeted asset transfers approaches are the outcomes of recent social protection revolution that especially consider accumulation of physical, financial, human, and social capital in order to build adaptive capacity of the urban extreme poor. This adaptive capacity of the extreme poor may facilitate adjustments in assets, livelihoods, behaviours, and technologies in order to reduce future climate vulnerability. In this context, this paper seeks to answer whether targeted asset transfer approaches can be considered as effective poverty-centred adaptation approaches for the urban extreme poor or not.     

Sustainable pesticide governance in Bangladesh: socio-economic and legal status interlinking environment,occupational health and food safety

Pesticides, regardless of their known toxic impacts to human health and environment, are widely used in the rapid growing agricultural sectors of developing countries. As an agricultural country with small lands and enormous population to feed, a developing country like Bangladesh rely heavily on the uses of pesticides to increase crop yields. Nevertheless, during the past decades, Peoples’ Republic of Bangladesh has experienced 26.46% decrease in total pesticide consumption. However, the presence of unregistered pesticides in the environmental samples and agricultural products has pointed out the weakness in the existing legal regime of the pesticide governance. This, in turn, is threatening the livelihood and health of the farmers, food safety and consumer health. This paper reviews the antiquity of the status of pesticide consumption, evolution and drawbacks of pesticide in the context of existing socio-economic position of Bangladesh. A consolidated uniform system is lacking to project pesticide management in the country. Existing legal policy, rules and regulations in the context of international agreements regarding pesticide management have been reviewed and suggested for further amendment. Moreover, role of green microfinance in sustainable management of pesticides and food safety were recommended. A framework is proposed for pesticide governance with a stronger pesticide surveillance program and coordination of ministries interlinking environmental, occupational health and food safety.     

The effect of atmospheric thermal conditions and urban thermal pollution on all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in Bangladesh

This study assessed the effect of temperature and thermal atmospheric conditions on all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in Bangladesh. In particular, differences in the response to elevated temperatures between urban and rural areas were investigated. Generalized additive models (GAMs) for daily death counts, adjusted for trend, season, day of the month and age were separately fitted for urban and rural areas. Breakpoint models were applied for determining the increase in mortality above and below a threshold (equivalent) temperature. Generally, a 'V'-shaped (equivalent) temperature-mortality curve with increasing mortality at low and high temperatures was observed. Particularly, urban areas suffered from heat-related mortality with a steep increase above a specific threshold. This adverse heat effect may well increase with ongoing urbanization and the intensification of the urban heat island due to the densification of building structures. Moreover, rising temperatures due to climate change could aggravate thermal stress.     

Assessing the genotoxic potentials of arsenic in tilapia (Oreochromis mossambicus) using alkaline comet assay and micronucleus test

This experiment was conducted to study the genotoxic potentials of sodium arsenite (NaAsO₂) in freshwater fish Oreochromis mossambicus by using alkaline comet assay and micronucleus (MN) test. Fish were exposed to three different concentrations (3 ppm, 28 ppm and 56 ppm) of arsenic and gill, liver and blood tissue samples were collected after 48 h, 96 h and 192 h of exposure. Arsenic exposure induced DNA damage in all tissues examined in a concentration dependent manner. A significant (p < 0.05) increase in the comet tail DNA (%) of the exposed fish liver, gill, and blood was observed after 48 h and 96 h of exposure, but a decline in DNA damage was recorded in all the tissues at all the three concentrations studied after 192 h of exposure. Liver tissue exhibited significantly (p < 0.05) higher DNA damage at all the concentrations examined, followed by gill and blood. Higher liver tail DNA (51.38 ± 0.21%) refers that it is more prone to injury to arsenic toxicity than the gill and blood. In blood samples arsenic induced micronucleus formation in a concentration dependent manner and highest (5.8 ± 0.46%) value was recorded in 56 ppm after 96 h of exposure, whereas, it was decreased after 192 h of exposure at all the three concentrations of NaAsO₂ examined which refers to the DNA repairing ability of fish to arsenic toxicity. The results of this study depict the genotoxic potentials of arsenic to fish which in turns provide insight on advanced study in aquatic toxicology.     

Modelling coordination in hospital emergency departments through social network analysis

Coordination theory provides a theoretical framework for analysing complex processes of project groups working towards a common goal. In this study, we explore the relationship between coordination and social networks for the development of a network-based coordination model. This model is applied to measure the performance and quality of complex and dynamic project coordination such as in hospital emergency departments. The dataset used for the study was collected by the 2004 National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey--a national probability sample survey of visits to emergency and outpatient departments of non-Federal, short-stay and general hospitals in the United States. Using social network analysis, this study allows us to understand the possible causes of inefficient coordination performance and coordination quality resulting in access blocks.     

Community attitudes toward forest conservation programs through collaborative protected area management in Bangladesh

The formulation of conservation policies with options for creating protected areas is significantly influenced by the social factors of the surrounding communities. Therefore, indigenous knowledge, attitudes and perceptions of the local communities need to be explored during the planning and implementation stages of conservation projects. A government-initiated experiment in co-management was conducted in the Rema-Kalenga Wildlife Sanctuary, Bangladesh. This paper analyzes the attitudes toward conservation by members of local communities living in and around the wildlife sanctuary. Training incentives on alternative income-generating (AIG) activities and allotment of agricultural lands were distributed among the Forest User Groups. It is of interest to policy makers and resource managers whether this technique leads to improved attitudes on the part of local people. Although there were different attitudes toward protected areas and conservation, overall, a favorable attitude of the respondents was observed. The opinions of respondents also varied based on factors such as village position, village dependency level on forest resources, ethnicity and gender. Increase in annual income resulting from the augmented skills by trainings on AIG activities and getting agricultural lands leased from the Forest Department contributed significantly to the variation in respondents’ conservation attitudes. It is suggested that eliminating inequity and inequality in incentive distribution, discovering and launching training on more need-based livelihood activities, and liberalizing the restriction of resource extraction from the protected area by fixing the harvesting limit would encourage the community to be more cordially and actively involved in the conservation efforts of the sanctuary.     

Impact of industrial effluent on growth and yield of rice (Oryza sativa L.) in silty clay loam soil

Degradation of soil and water from discharge of untreated industrial effluent is alarming in Bangladesh. Therefore, buildup of heavy metals in soil from contaminated effluent, their entry into the food chain and effects on rice yield were quantified in a pot experiment. The treatments were comprised of 0, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% industrial effluents applied as irrigation water. Effluents, initial soil, different parts of rice plants and post-harvest pot soil were analyzed for various elements, including heavy metals. Application of elevated levels of effluent contributed to increased heavy metals in pot soils and rice roots due to translocation effects, which were transferred to rice straw and grain. The results indicated that heavy metal toxicity may develop in soil because of contaminated effluent application. Heavy metals are not biodegradable, rather they accumulate in soils, and transfer of these metals from effluent to soil and plant cells was found to reduce the growth and development of rice plants and thereby contributed to lower yield. Moreover, a higher concentration of effluent caused heavy metal toxicity as well as reduction of growth and yield of rice, and in the long run a more aggravated situation may threaten human lives, which emphasizes the obligatory adoption of effluent treatment before its release to the environment, and regular monitoring by government agencies needs to be ensured.