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Mr. Hassan Bukhari's Profile

Hassan Bukhari is an Environmental Specialist at Hagler Bailly Pakistan. He has conducted many environmental impact assessments including those of coal mines and power plants in the Thar coal fields, and hydropower dams on the Jhelum River. He holds a Master’s degree in Natural Resources and Environment and a Graduate Certificate in Complex Systems from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor as well as a Bachelor’s degree in Physics from the Lahore University of Management Sciences.

He has worked on a wide breadth of multi-disciplinary projects for organizations such as the Great Lakes Commission, Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise, World Wildlife Fund, and the Heritage Foundation of Pakistan. He is also the co-founder of Cheruvu, a startup that is developing techniques to provide site specific nutrient management advice to rural farmers and is currently working with 5000 cotton farmers in rural India.

Abstract

The Kashmir Catfish and the Dam

Almost 40 years ago a lawyer with his students fought and won the landmark Supreme Court case, Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill, to prevent the construction of a dam on the Little Tennessee River due to the presence of an endangered fish - the snail darter that lived downstream from the proposed dam. I met this lawyer, while on the Fulbright, who had returned to the University of Michigan, to talk of this case as it was students at this university that helped fight and would go on to eventually win the case. It was motivating to be part of the department that played such a pivotal role in defining the conversation on endangered species in the United States.

That conversation has reached Pakistan and I am fortunate to be a part of it here. This talk will describe the multiple hydropower dams being installed in the Neelum-Jhelum River basin and the surprisingly major impact the presence of the Critically Endangered Kashmir Catfish has on the decision-making process of the developers, financing institutions and the government. It will describe my involvement, as part of Hagler Bailly Pakistan, including the technical assessment process, economic implications, stakeholder engagement and capacity building efforts that have been undertaken to save this fish.