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Sustainable Urbanization in India pp 181–205Cite as

How Expensive is the Decay of East Kolkata Wetlands? An Estimation of Opportunity Cost for Kolkata

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Part of the book series: Exploring Urban Change in South Asia ((EUCS))

Abstract

More than 80% of Kolkata’s sewage is naturally getting purified in East Kolkata Wetlands (EKW) where wastewater treatment and fishery practices are integrated through a rare correspondence of stages generating double dividend. The city of Kolkata enjoys a subsidized service of wastewater treatment as well as low-cost supply chain of fresh fish, vegetables, etc., and EKW is enjoying traditional livelihood options through wise-use practices. However, this delicately balanced ecosystem is threatened by the aggressive eastbound urban growth of the city. A significant change has been observed in the pattern of land use in the buffer area. To protect the wise-use of the wetland any further change in the pattern of land use in the core area has been legally prohibited. In spite of that a tendency towards vocation switching is noted all over the place. If this propensity continues and especially, if fisheries stop dominating the livelihood option of the local residents, then that will not only affect the low-cost supply chain available to the city dwellers, but also will challenge continuity of the waste management practice as well. The paper tried to estimate this opportunity cost for Kolkata.

The authors are grateful to National Field Services of India for support in conducting the primary survey.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The day population inclusive of floating population is close to 10.5 million (KMC, 2015).

  2. 2.

    The British named it “Calcutta” which has been established out of three small villages Sutanuti, Kolkata (Kalikata) and Gobindapur by Job Charnok in 1690. In this paper the two names “Calcutta” and “Kolkata” have been used interchangeably.

  3. 3.

    The natural elevation of the city of Calcutta is 6–7 m along the levee of the river Hugli in the West and only 0.26 m at the eastern wetland side (Chattopadhyaya, 2001).

  4. 4.

    MLD: Million litres per day.

  5. 5.

    In fact, the river Hugli is the downstream of river Ganga and, hence, cleaning up of Hugli water also came under the purview of GAP.

  6. 6.

    Only 15% of this huge amount of wastewater gets treated through sewage treatment plants (STPs) and a significant portion of the rest (nearly 78%) goes to EKW.

  7. 7.

    Approximately between latitudes 22° 25′–22° 40′ North and longitudes 88° 20′–88° 35′ East.

  8. 8.

    BOD: Biochemical oxygen demand.

  9. 9.

    Rhizofiltration: A process in which the plant roots are used to absorb pollutants, mainly metals from water and aqueous waste stream.

  10. 10.

    Organic matter is used as nutrient for the biological microorganisms (for example, activated sludge process). Fine suspended matter is filtered (for example, trickling filter).

  11. 11.

    An indigenous term: rural administrative unit (almost equivalent to village).

  12. 12.

    Prepared by the PAN Network in 2010.

  13. 13.

    Retrieved April 10, 2016 from http://www.ramsar.org/pdf/sitelist.pdf.

  14. 14.

    Later merged with Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA).

  15. 15.

    Later it was renamed and extended as Institute of Environmental Studies and Wetland Management (IESWM) in 2005.

  16. 16.

    We acknowledge sincere efforts from the National Field Services of India in helping us to collect field data.

  17. 17.

    Marginal Effect: \(\frac{{\delta P_{i} }}{{\delta X_{ji} }} = \beta_{j} \left[ {P_{i} \left( {1 - P_{i} } \right)} \right],\;j = {\text{AGE}},{\text{EDU}}\).

  18. 18.

    An average of O&M Cost ranging from Rs. 0.5 to 0.7 million/MLD/Year has been considered.

  19. 19.

    Adjusted for inflation.

  20. 20.

    A fractional value of α to ensure a falling fixed cost per unit of production; for any common effluent treatment plant the value of α is generally taken as 0.75 (see Anuradha, 2005; Bagchi & Banerjee, 2013).

  21. 21.

    If the cost estimate is carried out for 60% capacity utilization then the total treatment cost would be Rs. 5410 million per year and for 90% capacity utilization it would be Rs. 4193 million per year.

  22. 22.

    $1.00 is approximately equal to Rs. 60.00.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, School of Economics & Commerce, Adamas University, Kolkata, India

    Debanjana Dey

  2. University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India

    Sarmila Banerjee

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  1. Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, West Bengal, India

    Jenia Mukherjee

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Dey, D., Banerjee, S. (2018). How Expensive is the Decay of East Kolkata Wetlands? An Estimation of Opportunity Cost for Kolkata. In: Mukherjee, J. (eds) Sustainable Urbanization in India. Exploring Urban Change in South Asia. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-4932-3_10

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