A sanctuary for birds
> The Kol-e-Hashmat Khan wetlands outside war-torn Kabul have been designated a UN conservation site for migratory flocks
succession of conflicts afterwards, including the civil war in the early 1990s, Afghans were preoccupied by their own survival – and the environment suffered.
War saw the marshes more or less abandoned until 2005, Scanlon explains, adding that land grabbing was common in the chaos of the 90s as Afghans fought for survival.
The marshes became a sanctuary, providing safe haven and water.
As Afghanistan’s population swelled with the return of refugees after the Taliban were toppled in 2001, Scanlon says the situation became a “tragedy of the commons”.
The phrase refers to an economic theory in which individuals act in their own selfinterest towards a shared resource, but against the common good.
“Everyone is taking a piece to survive but all together, this is a tragedy, it’s no one’s fault but everybody is guilty,” he says.
According to the UN, about 50 hectares of wild land were taken over by tribal leaders, which the Afghan environmental protection agency, created in 2005, is now trying to recover.
“Some politicians are reluctant” to act, but attitudes are changing,” says Muhibullah Fazli, the agency’s biodiversity expert.
The most important thing, he adds, is to educate the locals.
“The problem is the people taking their cattle to graze, cutting the reeds, local people pouring their garbage in the river ... they don’t know the scientific value of this area,” says Fazli.
Together with the Qargha reservoir, Kol-e-Hashmat Khan, a marsh some eight metres deep at its centre, is one of Kabul’s two water sources.
But experts are already worried about its falling water levels.
NGO Afghanistan Youths Greens was ordered by UNEP to organise waste collection and educate the villagers who will continue to live on the shores.
“At the beginning, people didn’t accept us but finally we managed to convince them,” says the organisation’s director, Mohammad Shafaq.
Fazli adds: “I told them what the Holy Book has said. Birds are a community just like yours ... they need a habitat and they need food.” – AFP