Posted by: APA
Posted date : July 7, 2015
Water hyacinth, an aquatic weed, continues to infest Ethiopia’s biggest lake, threatening the livelihood of over 2.5 million people, APA can reveal on Tuesday.
The source of the aquatic weed has not yet been identified but has so far infested 40 thousand hectares of the shore and one- tenth of the Lake Tana since its appearance in 2010.
If not controlled, the infestation can embed the mouth of Lake Tana which is the water source of the nation’s hydro electric power dams including Tana Beles and the controversial big dam being built over the River Nile.
An FAO sponsored meeting was held in Addis Ababa to dwell on the mitigation strategy before it goes out of hand and becomes a problem for the entire region.
Lake Tana is the source livelihood for more than 2.5 million people, its economic value is more than 2 billion birr (4100000) per year.
This is a significant amount. We lose this amount every year,†Ethiopia’s Minister of Agriculture, Wondirad Mandefro said.
The aquatic weed, with rapid rate of dispersing and reproductive output, has once again been uprooted with involvement of over half a million local people but the re-infestation continues, Dr, Amlaku Asres, one of the researchers, said.
The impact is so the significant not only in terms of livelihood but also in terms of biodiversity too. The Lake, you know we have endemic fish species and it affects also the survival of the endemic fish species and the Lake is also biodiversity hotspot for birds. We have more than 300 species of birds around the Lake and it affects also birds. So, the damage is really significant,†the researcher added
Over 14 million birr ($700,000) has been proposed to deal with the invasive weed in the coming five years.
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