Wetland Sanctuary Co-management and Conflict: An Exploratory Study of the Impacts of the Baikka Beel Project in Bangladesh

In 2003, the Government of Bangladesh declared Baikka Beel, a 100-hectare wetland in the north-eastern part of the country, as a permanent wetland sanctuary conservation project intended to preserve its fish breeding and bio-diversity. Within the framework of the Borogangina Resource Management Organisation, a co-managed project was launched with the support of the USAID. Through a community husbandry initiative several NGOs and one multi-national company also took part in the project. Field research was conducted in 2012 to explore the socio-economic and environmental impacts of the co-managed project. The research revealed that the primary dependent group (i. e. the fishermen) who live in the surrounding vicinity were excluded from the co-management process and that the project impacted their economic, social, political and cultural lives considerably. The top-down approach apparently failed to persuade relevant stakeholders to buy in, resulting in a conflict among three relevant project stakeholder groups as they perceived and pursued their interests on a piecemeal basis.