A thousand polluted gardens: Bangladesh

I recently spent time photographing Hazaribagh, Bangladesh, documenting the livelihoods of those working and living in the toxic leather tanneries in the area, as well recording the environmental cost of the industry fuelled by heavy demand of cheap leather for European markets.

Hazaribagh was labelled the 5th most polluted location in the world in a study of the World’s worst polluted places by the Blacksmith Institute and Green Cross Switzerland in 2013. With increased attention the pressure to move to a new tannery site in Savar with modern treatment facilities has been great. However, for locals in Hazaribagh this potential move brings with it a sense of uncertainty as their livelihoods have been dependent on the industry for so long. Despite this, the damage of the industry wreaked upon residents and the environment are undeniable.

In 2001 a High Court ruling in Bangladesh deemed Hazaribagh a threat to the environment and recognised the hazardous working conditions of the workers and ordered its relocation to a new site. Tannery associations and the government overruled this by rejecting and extending the deadline multiple times to the point where the move to Savar is still being sidelined.

Whilst proposals to move to the new site remain under debate, the residents continue to suffer from the damaging effects of poisonous runoff water from the tanneries. Cancer rates reach alarming proportions in Hazaribagh and the part of the Buriganga that flows nearby is tainted blue, and sometimes red, from the chemical laden water.

About the author:
Adib Chowdhury was born in 1991. He is a freelance photographer interested in human rights, politics and conflict. Having recently graduated from the London School of Economics he now works in Brussels.

Accidents are commonplace inside the factories with little oversight regarding health and safety. Injuries include respiratory diseases, difficulties with eyesight from the chemicals in the air, as well as severed limbs.

Villagers from the surrounding tanneries are often involved in the leather tanning process by working in factories or participating indirectly through menial jobs such as transporting leather from the factories to fields for drying as shown.

A tannery worker takes a newly pressed hide out of a machine.

Hassan Ali, aged 11, collects leftovers from the carcasses of animals used for leather hides. He wants to work in the industry as his family has done for the past few generations and says the move to Savar will be difficult for him as he might have to relocate.

A man leads a goat and a sheep to slaughter for leather.

Animal carcasses are rounded up and tied together into bags that are then dumped. The rotting carcasses draw in vermin and disease to the inhabitants of the area.

Animal carcasses are rounded up and tied together into bags that are then dumped. The rotting carcasses draw in vermin and disease to the inhabitants of the area.

Al Amin, 20, works in a tannery dyeing leather goods. He says he is willing to move should the tanneries uproot but is unsure about the reality of finding a job when priority will likely be given to locals in the new area in Savar.

A closer look at the runoff water from the tanneries. Toxic water, plastic, animal and human waste, all flow together into the Buriganga river. Residents of Hazaribagh fish in the river and ingest some of the chemicals released by the tanneries elevating their risk of fatal diseases.

Residents of Hazaribagh clutch their noses from the foul odour of rotting animal carcasses and waste water that flows through the area.

Local workers sprint back and forth from the factories transporting large volumes of leather by hand carts in the mid day heat.

Workers handle leather in pits filled with sulfuric acid and sodium sulfide that can burn tissue, eye membrane, skin, and the respiratory tract. Other chemicals such as formaldehyde are known potential human carcinogens, the health effects of which appear years after exposure.

Children play amongst one of many giant mounds of leather pieces littered around the area.

A lady collects hides that have been left to dry in the heat,

The bleaching process that the hides undergo taints the wastewater a distinctive blue colour. The water containing toxic compounds runs through open sewers where it mixes with human waste, and animal fat left over from disposed carcasses.

A man staples leather that will be used for handbags to wooden boards in order to dry.