2.1 Description of the study area
The peninsula is located in Cox’s Bazar, a southeastern most district of
Bangladesh. As this study focuses on the impact of Rohingya on forest
degradation and ecosystem function loss, it considers administrative
boundaries of Bangladesh Forest Department (BFD). In Cox’s Bazar
district, there are two forest divisions, i.e., north and south, however
refugee camps are mostly built in South division (BFD GIS Database).
Based on influx of Rohingya and their catchment area, this study takes
23 beats into account (beat is the smallest forest administrative unit,
defined by BFD) of south forest division. To understand future condition
of forest cover, we further consider some portion of the Naikhongchari
beat of Bandarban forest division defined by IOM and FAO (2017). The use
of beat may be beneficial to investigate future impact of refugee in
every direction from existing camps. There are three sub-districts
(upazilas ) and 24 beats within the study area (Fig. 1).
Geographically, it is located between 92° 17ʹ E, 20° 50ʹ N and 92° 12ʹ
E, 21° 19ʹ N, and covers an area of 41,162 ha.
Irrespective of administrative boundaries, defined by BFD and Bangladesh
Bureau of Statistics (BBS), environmentally, the study area situated in
a very sensitive ecosystem. It includes Teknaf Wildlife Sanctuary (TWS)
(GoB, 2009; BFD, 2014) formerly known as the Teknaf Game Reserve (TGR)
(Alam et al. 2012). Besides, it has proposed Inani National Park
(Nishorgo, 2019), which is a reserve forest (Belal, 2013; Rahman, 2011).
The area of the TWS is 11,615 ha (Green, 1987; Nishorgo, 2019,
Moslehuddin et al., 2018), covering 25% of the study area, and situated
in close proximity to Rohingya camps. Inani Reserve Forest has an area
of 15,500 ha, covering 33% of our study area. The other reserve forest
comprises an area of 6,365 ha, which covers 13.5% of the study area.
Therefore, 71% of the study area includes a critical ecosystem and the
rest (29%) is no– forested land, occupied by human settlements
and agricultural lands. As a tropical semi– evergreen forest,
the area is home to a wide variety of flora and fauna, including 55
mammals, around 280 birds, 56 reptiles, 13 amphibians and 290 plant
species (Khan, 2008; Nishorgo, 2019). The study area also serves as a
key habitat to critically endangered flagship species of Asian Elephants
(Elephus Maximus ) (Khan, 2015). It is characterized by hot and
humid climatic conditions, and therefore, conducive for a range of
biodiversity (Butler, 2012). Prior to recent influx, Rohingya
communities are living in two camps since 1942 (Fig. 1) (Human Rights
Watch, 2000) within the study area. After 25th of
August 2017, with a massive influx, they are now located in 48 camps.
The density of Rohingya population is shown in Fig. 1.