January 29, 2019

Although wetlands may often be seen as wastelands or empty spaces for development, they are in fact treasures of natural and cultural heritage, and can serve as significant allies in the fight against climate change. Every 2 February, World Wetlands Day seeks to remind us of their importance and raise awareness of the valuable benefits that they provide to humans. Wetlands are constantly threatened by deforestation due to rapid urbanization in coastal cities. This is especially so in Singapore, where 90 percent of its original mangrove cover has already been lost to land reclamation and reservoir construction. The Nee Soon freshwater swamp is the only substantial freshwater swamp remaining in Singapore, making it one of the most important conservation sites in the country.

Canh Tien Trinh Nguyen (NUS Geography and the Tropical Marine Science Institute), Professor Alan Ziegler (NUS Geography), and others recently published the article ‘Soil elemental analysis in a high conservation tropical forest in Singapore’ in the Journal of Environmental Management, which reveals the distribution of soil elemental concentrations and identifies the potential sources of trace metal contamination in the Nee Soon freshwater swamp. They discovered that anthropogenic activities, likely from military training, had enriched the lower part of the catchment with undesirable elements such as Cu, Pb, and Sb. These elements were found in high concentrations in localized spots near the military live firing sites. They also attributed the increase in Ba, Sr, and Zn in the lower part of the catchment to military activities, reassuring us that given their moderate concentrations, environmental impacts should be negligible. The authors stressed the need to monitor the impact of military and anthropogenic activities in Nee Soon freshwater swamp, given the precarious nature of the site.

Read the article here: https://www-sciencedirect-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/science/article/pii/S0301479718313719