Bangladesh announced yesterday that it will build one of the world’s largest refugee camps to house 800,000 Rohingya Muslims who have fled violence and persecution in Myanmar. The UN has praised Bangladesh’s “extraordinary spirit of generosity” in opening its borders, but the ecological effects of the mass influx of refugees may present new risks.
The new Kutupalong mega-camp, which will house people currently staying in 23 smaller camps scattered around the area, was initially meant be built on 2,000 acres. However, when numbers of incoming refugees began to surge recently after a brief lull, an additional 1,000 acres had to be added to the plan.
“The numbers have gone up by more than 100,000, and people are still coming,” Mohammad Shah Kamal, Bangladesh’s secretary of disaster management and relief, said on Thursday. “So the government has to allocate [another] 1,000 acres of forest land.”
The plan is for trees to be cleared from these 1,000 acres before 50,000 tarpaulin shelters are set up in their place, bringing the total deforested area over the last month to 4,500 acres in Bangladesh’s Ukhia sub-district alone.
This rapid deforestation may intensify the conflict between humans and elephants in the area. Rohingya refugee camps have already begun to block the natural migratory routes of as many as 50 wild elephants in the area, and wildlife experts fear that this could lead to their extinction if the routes remain closed.
Furthermore, the World Wildlife Fund has warned that the placement of human settlements on elephant migratory routes can lead to conflict between the two species. Last month, two elderly Rohingya refugees were trampled to death Monday by wild elephants as they slept underneath a plastic sheet near a forest.
However, with thousands of Rohingya coming in every day to escape violence perpetrated by the Myanmar army, Cox’s Bazar Deputy Commissioner Md. Ali Hossain said: “The government has no other option without any other land at its disposal.”
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