Bringing Kashmir’s lakes back to life

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0:52The Documentary, home of the best documentaries from the BBC World Service. Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service. People fixing the world.

1:12I'm your host, Myra Anubi, and the person who is annoyingly optimistic about a better future. So today I'm taking you to India to meet people who are working hard to stop their legs from disappearing.

1:31I used to live quite close to a lake and it was one of the best experiences just being able to go over and sit by its shores and occasionally we would see hippos sneak out of the water and also being able to catch the sun setting on its horizon the lake was always inviting it was a place where family and friends would come together to meet but also it was a lifeline for many people who fished and fed from it. So I'm sad because around the world, lakes are disappearing. I mean, just looking at this, Lake Ngami in Botswana, Lake Mead in the US, Mali, Bolivia, rising temperatures, pollution, rapid urbanization and encroachment.

2:14These are just some of the many reasons why lakes are under enormous pressure. But this show is all about solutions. And our search today is taking us to India, where our reporter, Chavi Satchdev, has visited two lakes in the northern state of Kashmir to see how they've turned a corner. I've got Chavi on the line. Chavi, before we start, I mean, Kashmir, it's known for many things, including having some of the largest freshwater lakes in the world, right? It is. It's also unfortunately known for its place in political and international conflict, but it is very, very beautiful. And it has something like 700 lakes surrounded by mountains, which is why it's also known as Paradise on Earth.

2:59Earlier this year, though, I also saw alarming headlines and one of them said that more than 500 lakes in the state are set to disappear. 500 is so many. I mean, Chavi, what's happening? Well, let me give you an example. Woolar, once the largest freshwater lake in Asia, it's far northwest in India towards the Pakistan border, has been not only the lifeline for the 30 villages around it, it's also an important flood basin for the entire state. But in 1992, there were massive floods in the region. When the floodwaters receded, the basin was left with a lot of additional silt or sediment and everything from fish to flowers were affected.

3:40and when authorities mapped the catchment areas, they found that the lake had lost an estimated 30 % of its capacity. I mean, that sounds really bad, but the big question is how then do you save a dying lake, Chavi? Well, it takes a lot of work and in Woolar they have been doing a lot to bring the lake back to life and Mayra, there's a very special flower involved so I had to go see for myself.

4:08I've just gotten in a small wooden boat with a wide cushion seat and a canopy Our boatman or Shikarawala is 19 year old Faisal and he's alternating between using the motor and skillfully rowing with the traditional heart shaped paddle It used to be really nice here There was a lot of water and we harvested lotuses water chestnuts and even got fodder for our cows. There was plenty of water. That's what my father and grandfather tell me. It was clean. We bathed in it. You could even drink it. But it started to get dirty. Then in 1992, when the flood came, the lotus flowers finished. They disappeared entirely.

4:57For some, lotuses are just a pretty water flower. But for Kashmiri culture, cuisine and even the local economy, lotuses are really special. After lotuses ripen, their seed pods and stems are harvested and sold. So when the lotuses disappeared, it was a real blow for the local communities. And the flood didn't just affect the lotuses, it also affected other aquatic crops like water chestnuts. Even the water chestnuts, which we call Shingadas, dwindled. our livelihood was really diminished. But many years later, things are improving. As far as the eye can see, there are dozens of kishtis, or wooden boats narrow like a canoe, moving across the lake.

5:46The kishtis are occupied by mostly women in wide-brimmed hats and gloves who are gathering up the water chestnuts. Under a cloudless sky, the water chestnut patches are so dense, the lake actually looks green. I feel like I could walk on them. So what changed?

6:06A consortium of government departments called the Woolar Lake Conservation and Management Authority, or RUKMA, stepped in to revive the lake. The main thing they did is to remove 8 million cubic metres of silt from the lake. That's more than 3 ,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools worth. They distributed this rich, fertile soil to farmers in the area and also used it to build dikes around Woolar to prevent future flood-related incidents. Five years ago, the dredging started and because of that, now the lotuses are slowly, slowly coming back. And so are the water chestnuts. Faisal says the dredging dramatically changed the lake for the better.

6:53There's water here. He used to play cricket here. It was actually an open ground. People from many villages came and played cricket. There were many trees also. Even now, there are small islands within the lake. There are geese roosting there and cattle grazing after swimming over from the shore. Closer to the shore, I see hundreds of submerged trees sticking out. These willow trees sprung up after the 1992 flood and are considered invasive in this area. Altaf Hussain is from Uqma and he tells me the target is to cut 2 million willows, of which they've cut 140 ,000. It is a habitat intervention.

7:33It's not just any other kind of a deforestation because in order to conserve the lake, this is what is required. So this is prescription rather than just simply the removal of the trees. It's not destruction. It's not destruction because that is essential for the revival of the willow.

7:50Once the silt soil and willow trees have been removed, water can move in and take their place. Sunlight can filter through the water. And with this space, light and oxygen, the rhizomes of the lotuses that are still dormant in the lake bed start to germinate. And lo and behold, a miracle nobody was expecting happened last year. Lotuses were back. the lake was carpeted in gorgeous pink blossoms. Local bird watchers also reported that last year, migratory birds from Siberia were spotted for the first time in decades, and improved water oxygen levels are expected to result in better fish breeding too.

8:35There are still plenty of challenges though. In a different part of the lake, Nizaram Dar and his wife have peeled off their gloves, opened a thermos of chai, and are stopped for a tea break. They've been harvesting water chestnuts for decades. They were bigger back then. Now they're small. Nizaram tells me before the flood, collecting a boat full of water chestnuts took only two hours. Now it takes them six. But he's hopeful he can start making more money, not just from the water chestnuts. I make much more profit from lotuses. That harvest happens in November. It's a lot more effort and it's cold work.

9:16I have to get chest high in water in the freezing cold, but I make a lot more money. And as our boats idle, I notice another problem, an unmistakable brown film on the water. And now we are literally cutting through sewage that's on the surface of the lake. It's filthy. We've got bathroom waste coming straight into Woolar. I don't get into the water without my uniform, which is waterproof. And yes, I wear gloves. The conservation authority know about this and told me fixing untreated waste coming into the lake is a high priority. They're building several new sewage treatment plants on an accelerated timeline.

10:05The vision is to have cleaner water, healthier flora and fauna, and eventually bring back tourists and bird watchers. People go to see tulips in Amsterdam, cherry blossoms in Kyoto. Why not lotuses in Woola? Back on shore, my boatman's dad, Mushtaq, agrees that the return of the lotus heralds a more hopeful future for everyone in the district. The lake is our life. From childhood, I've worked in the lake. I have educated my boy from the lake. Our life, our earnings, everything, it all depends on the lake. This is the documentary from the BBC World Service. Self-directed investing, trading, full-service wealth management, automated investing, financial planning, thematic investing, retirement planning.

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11:40Plus, ditch that where's my money feeling. Most transfers arrive in under 20 seconds. Join millions saving billions on hidden fees. Be smart. Get wise. Download the Wise app today. T's and C's apply. I'm Myra Anubi and you're listening to People Fixing the World. And in this episode, it's all about restoring India's wonderful lakes. I've still got our reporter Chavi Satchdev down the line, this time with a solution to save another lake that's pretty famous.

12:18Not just pretty famous, Myra, it's the most famous lake in India. It's called Dal and it's in the heart of the capital city, Srinagar. Many famous Bollywood songs are set in Dal Lake. Since the 50s, we've seen our movie stars romance on Shikara boats, cavorting with gorgeous snow-capped peaks in the backdrop. It's very beautiful and very romantic. I'm sure I've seen this in some of the movies I've watched as well. But Chavi, the lake is in trouble, right? Yes, there are a lot of issues, like chemicals and waste getting into the lake. It's not great for the lake or the fish or the birds, and it also results in too many weeds.

12:57a problem one man came face to face with. During a walk that me and my wife decided that we'll take along the Dal Lake, I saw these piles of lake weeds accumulated. This is Maninder Singh Nair. More than 10 years ago, he was at the lake to celebrate his first wedding anniversary when he saw how bad the situation was. When I went close to the water, trying to feel the moment, beautiful, as it's shown in movies, Shikara and all that, I was really surprised by the reality that the lake was choking. The water was green and orange at many places. The weed was accumulated on the banks of the lake at multiple places.

13:50and the whole scene was just not good to smell and see. Now, Myra, when most people visit Kashmir, they return home with its beautiful embroidery or papier-mâché handicrafts. But Maninder was different. He took three kilograms of weeds back home. His poor wife. Well, apparently she's used to him because he was already working in the field of waste management and he was determined to find a solution. After spending some time testing the weeds, he realised they could be turned into something useful. What we planned and what we have been able to do is that we take this lakeweed, convert it into organic manure through a process which is environmentally beneficial.

14:36So Chavi, he started turning the weeds into fertiliser. That's right. And so I went to Dal Lake to see how it's done. At 8am every morning, more than 100 boatmen set out to cull weeds from the lake. So I've just met 14 of the weed collectors. They're gathered on the embankment for a break. They're having tea and then they demonstrated for me how to get the weeds out on their kishtis, their boats, which are made out of Deodar's cedar wood. And they each have a willow tree stem branch, which is long and skinny but always bent, and that's what they use to basically get, they twirl the weed out of the water like you would twirl spaghetti around a fork until it snaps, and then they pull out a bunch of it that's wrapped around, put it in the middle of the boat, and then eventually when the boat is full, they come to the unloading site and dump it all there.

15:44In peak summer, when the weeds are really abundant, there could be up to 400 men to cull weeds or ghas as they call it. One of the weed collectors who's been working the lake since he was a child is Mohamed Kasim. So do you think this work is important? Oh yes, the lake has so many weeds. We can't leave them. They'll only get worse. We have to maintain the lake. I'm actually reporting about the new facility that's making it into fertilizer. Oh yes, fertilizer. Earlier they took it to a dumping site. I think what they're doing today is better. That they make compost and give to the landowners, to the farmers and orchards.

16:32Just two kilometers up from where I meet the weed collectors, is Maninder's biofertiliser plant. On 11 acres of land provided by the Lake Conservation Management Authority of Dal, most of the site is open ground, except for a shed with large machinery and a small hill of nearly dry and ready compost. Round back is the collection area, where every day their trucks make multiple trips carrying tons of dripping wet weeds fresh from the lake.

17:03I'm being told to move away. as the truck bed is raised.

17:12Oh, even further back, because there is some stinky stuff coming out.

17:22Okay, that was 3 ,000 kilograms of weed from Dul Lake.

17:33and it smells quite quite awful actually so the truck has dumped them into a little bit of a sink there is a little channel made for the water to drip out i can see stems that are long and skinny reddish brown the leaves look green on the top surface but mostly it's just covered in Filth. It smells like sewage.

18:08After the weeds have dried in the sun, they're taken through the machines. They are wrung out and shredded into smaller pieces.

18:20Then they are ground up into paste Sorted and cleaned to remove all plastic and debris They're treated for heavy metals And also enriched with nutrients With testing after each stage To ensure the fertilizer is meeting industry standards So they fall through the hopper Then they go into a bag And how, oh wow That's a lot of fertilizer How much is in each bag? 50 kg. 50 kgs of fertilizer. OK. It takes three truckloads of weed to make one bag of fertilizer. But the problem with the weeds is larger than this. Weeds will continue to flourish and grow unless there's a change in the way farming is done around Dal Lake.

19:04It's the runoff from the chemicals used in orchards and fields draining into the lake and making a perfect ecosystem for weeds to abound that needs to be addressed. Which brings us to another part of the solution, because farmers can now turn away from chemical fertilisers and switch to the organic fertiliser.

19:2870 kilometres from Dul Lake, in Wanpo, Ruby Begum grows apples, plums and apricots. She switched to the organic fertiliser made from weeds two years ago, and she still sprays with pesticide, but much less, maybe six times in a season, which is half of what she'd need to spray if she were using chemical fertilizer.

19:51I asked if she's happy with the result and if it's changed anything. And she said the fruit is better, of course. And I can see that the apples and plums are really shiny and huge. She buys the biofertilizer from Gulaam Rasool Ittu, a farmer who owns the local agricultural supply store. Though he also sells regular fertilizer, he himself doesn't use any. He is such a staunch supporter of organic farming, he makes a compelling case for it to all his customers, whether they grow fruit or vegetables. See, first of all, the price is better. Normal fertilizer costs 3 ,000 rupees or$30 for 100 kilos.

20:36It comes from far away, so the shipping cost is a big component of the price. It has a higher carbon footprint and of course it's full of chemicals. Ghulam Rasool Ito thinks it is the ultimate solution. This organic fertilizer costs one third less, which is a huge saving. And then there's the question of our health. Who doesn't want to eat safer, healthier food? I know soon enough people will drive the market towards chemical-free fertilizers. He has one last weapon in his arsenal. It's now recommended by the government.

21:13The state's directorate of horticulture has officially endorsed a comprehensive transition policy to shift the farmers and orchardists away from chemical fertilizers and toward tested bio-organic alternatives. In this video, which is shared on messaging apps, the head of the horticultural department says, yes, the process is slow. But farmers can do integrated farming over a three-year period to wean themselves off conventional fertilizers, and within a few harvests, they will stop needing chemical insecticides. Organic fertilizers, it says, will be better for their crop yields and for their health.

21:52For Maninder, the state's backing provides the ultimate validation.

22:18And on the other side, the lake will get its restoration and it will get better and better ecologically. Chavi, this is a proper trash to treasure sort of story. But I'm just wondering, wouldn't it be better also for the lake to just find a permanent solution to get rid of the weeds? A hundred percent, Myra. But for that, what's coming into the lakes has to be managed better. The industrial and chemical runoff has to decrease and all waste must be treated. There are several smaller NGOs that are working to clean up plastic and other waste material from the lake. And there are also a couple of environmentalists raising awareness amongst the boat people and residents about cleaning it up.

22:59So, Chavi, with the work that is happening, is it making a difference? It is. The lake is healthier. Removing weeds helps water flow and also improves oxygen for fish and other aquatic life. And it's also helping the city. Many locals told me that earlier the heaps of weeds used to obviously look terrible, but also smell really noxious. Now every truckload of weeds hauled off to the facility is also a truckload of chemicals and heavy metals that are permanently removed from the ecosystem. I see, Chavi. So the hope is while the efforts to stop the pollution scale up, what's happening with the weeds currently is important for the immediate survival of the lake.