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Int'l study to begin to protect Mekong fish from dams
AP. June 24, 2009
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D990R0200&show_article=1
TOKYO, June 24 (AP) - (Kyodo)An international environmental study on
the Mekong River will begin to protect giant catfish and numerous
other freshwater fish there from planned dam construction, Japanese
researchers said Wednesday.
Amid worries about plans to build more than 30 major dams along the
4,000-kilomter river running from China through Southeast Asia, the
study will examine the ecosystem of the fish and try to clarify the
dams' impact on them, they said.
With Japan's National Institute for Environmental Studies playing a
central role, the international research project is designed to apply
findings from similar studies the Japanese institute has carried out
in Hokkaido.
"We hope to go as far as estimating the amount of fish catches and
income from fisheries to be lost by dam construction, and provide a
scenario for Mekong River development that contributes to preserving
biodiversity and fisheries resources," chief researcher Michio
Fukushima said.
In the project, researchers will engage in field studies on the
species and distribution of freshwater fish and features of their
habitats in the Mekong River, and feed the information into a
geographical information system that will present the data on a
computerized map and serve as a database, they said.
They will also catch about 20 major species of migratory fish in
countries such as Cambodia, Thailand and Laos, and try to figure out
their migration routes by measuring chemical substances accumulated in
the otolith, a bonelike structure found in the head.
Based on the data, the project team will estimate by computer
simulation the impact on the fishes' survival of building dams to cut
their migration routes or reduce water, and even suggest places where
a dam would have minimum impact on the ecosystem, they said.
Other participants in the project include universities and research
institutes from Cambodia and Thailand plus the WorldFish Center, which
is an international research institution based in Malaysia. |
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