Climate change impacts in Bangladesh
With the Himalayas to the north and the Bay of Bengal to the south, Bangladesh sits on one of the world’s largest and most densely populated deltas, where the Jamuna, Padma and Meghna rivers converge.
Bangladesh
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Water crisis aggravates in port city
Mainul Haq, a senior executive of a shipping company, requires water supply at least thrice a day to carry his daily household work and other needs of a four-member family at his Agrabad CDA Colony residence. Instead, he gets water twice a day and sometimes once, and this poor supply for the last few weeks put him in deep trouble and hassle. And he often found at a loss how to cope with the ever-compounding crisis.
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Disasters, natural and man-made
HONG KONG: On the day of the Sichuan earthquake, I happened to be in Bengkulu, the province of Sumatra, Indonesia, which has been experiencing almost weekly quakes that measure about 5 on the Richter scale, following one that measured 8.5 last September. Despite its magnitude, that earthquake killed just 25 people. This raises the question: What combination of nature, chance, human activity and government competence determines the death toll when a cyclone, earthquake or tsunami strikes?
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Bangladesh wages campaign to sell citizens on the potato
DHAKA, Bangladesh: Potatoes are not traditionally high on the menu for the 140 million people in Bangladesh, but a surge in rice and wheat prices has prompted the government to popularize the humble spud as a substitute food. "Think potato, grow potato and eat potato," was the main slogan of a three-day potato festival in Dhaka last week.
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Fall in groundwater level, power outages blamed
Frequent power outages and sharp fall in the groundwater level have aggravated water crisis in the Khulna city. The Khulna City Corporation can presently supply only 1.5 crore to 1.75 crore gallons of water per day against the demand for 3 crore gallons. Sources in the corporation said they had 72 wells, 2,825 deep tube wells and 5,942 shallow tube wells and 15,000 water connections in the city. Besides, some households in the city use shallow and deep tube-wells of their own, they added.
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Traffic congestion turns acute in Dhaka
Traffic congestion, a common scene on roads in the Dhaka city, causes immense sufferings to the city dwellers by eating up time of their daily life. One cannot say for certain that he/she will reach their destinations without facing traffic congestion on working days and even on the weekends. Haphazard parking of vehicles and picking up passengers here and there are mainly blamed for traffic congestions in the capital, some city people said.
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Climate change forcing people to migrate to urban areas
More and more people are migrating to urban areas because of climate change as it is causing frequent natural disasters, making the disaster-prone areas unlivable, experts said at a seminar yesterday. It would be difficult to provide employment for the increasing number of migrants, but the government remains indifferent to this issue, they said. Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit (RMMRU) organised the seminar on 'Climate change, migration and Bangladesh' at the RC Majumder Auditorium at Dhaka University.
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Low income food insecurity
RESIDENTS of Dhaka city, and others across the country, see daily lines of hundreds of people in fixed price shops in various neighbourhoods. Being lucky enough to still be insulated from food inflation, I ventured into one of the shops to obtain first hand information. Each outlet has 1,000 kgs of rice, the product most in demand, which are sold in a maximum of 5 kg parcels. The official claimed that there are almost 2,000 such shops in the country with an additional 2,000 more to be opened.
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50 species of birds under threat of extinction
There is yet some shocking news for the environmentalists and nature lovers that almost 50 species of country birds are under threat of extinction. According to available statistics around 10 species of birds have been extinct from Bangladesh since its inception in 1971. Among over 600 species of birds including 400 indigenous and 200 migratory birds, about 50 rare species are under extreme threat of disappearance. Most critically threatened birds include white-backed vulture,
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All attempts to save Buriganga go futile
The Buriganga along with other rivers in Dhaka is dying out due to continued encroachments, and acute pollution caused by dumping of industrial waste. As per the suggestions and the demands made by environmentalists and green activists, the past governments had taken initiatives from time to time in a bid to save the rivers from encroachers and polluters but in vain. In 2003, the then government formed a task force to save the Buriganga, Turag, Balu and Sitalakhya and took some decisions, including eviction of the encroachers.
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Tannery relocation project (Editorial)
THE need for moving the tannery units away from city's Hazaribagh area has always been felt acutely by the environmentalists and the decision makers alike, considering the severe negative impact of the industry on environment. But little progress has been made to relocate them in Savar, even after three years of inauguration of the relocation project there.