The most important water resources are wetlands like lakes and reservoirs. Apart from being sources of water, lakes are highly productive ecosystems. Coastal lakes like Chilika lake and inland lake like Ansupa lake, Orissa are very important water resources. Ansupa lake is the largest very old fresh water lake of Orissa. Realizing the importance of conserving the lake the State Govt. has initiated an Integrated Sustainable Environmental Management Programme like Catchment Area Treatment, including soil conservation measures with heavy plantations to arrest siltation and eutrophication, engineering intervention to augment floor circulation of water by opening inlet channel from river Mahanadi and developing outlet channel, desilting and deweeding activities.