Paradigm shift in the management of the Sundarbans mangrove forest of Bangladesh: Issues and challenges

The Sundarbans is the largest continuous mangrove forest of the world, which is rich in both the floral and faunal diversity compared to other mangrove forests of the World. It has long historical records of forest conversion and management. The objectives of this study were to synthesis the management interventions for the Sundarbans and to find out the issues and challenges that encountered the management objectives. The conversion, management, and conservation efforts for the Sundarbans during the last 240 years can be grouped into four distinct time periods based on the outlook of resources use e.g. conversion for agriculture 1780 to 1875; timber production for revenue and control for theft 1876 to 1951; inventory based management 1952 to 1992; integrated management & co-management, and project-based overlapping management 1993-2020. This chronology of outlook was the journey towards the conservation of the Sundarbans ecosystem and also explains the importance of this ecosystem on the national to the regional and global scale. Finally, it was relished that involvement of local people/ community in the management in the form of co-management is now obvious for the protection, conservation, and management of the Sundarbans. However, there are some important issues and challenges that are related to the management of the Sundarbans. The important issues and challenges that are over-exploitation of resources, change in vegetation pattern, poor recruitment of important tree species, habitat degradation, invasive species, poaching and wildlife trafficking, salinity, extreme weather events, uncontrolled tourism, pollution, etc., which are dynamic in nature and need to pay strategic attention to the better protection and management of the Sundarbans ecosystem. It is believed that the findings of this study may contribute to adopting effective management interventions for the other mangrove forests of the world.