[🇧🇩] Save the Rivers/Forests/Hills-----Save the Environment

[Saif]

Reduce overreliance on groundwater

Govt must explore alternative fresh water sources

www.thedailystar.net

Reduce overreliance on groundwater
Govt must explore alternative fresh water sources

We are alarmed by the rapid decline in groundwater levels across the country, particularly in Dhaka, Gazipur, and the Barind region, due to excessive extraction. According to reports, residents on the city's outskirts are facing acute shortages of fresh water, primarily due to WASA's ineffective management of groundwater. The crisis is particularly severe in areas like Vakurta, Baherchar, Battoli Bazar, Balughata, and Bauta, where numerous pumps installed by WASA about a decade ago have contributed to the depletion of groundwater. As a result, around 20,000 hand-operated tube wells have dried up entirely. Residents of these areas now struggle to access water, with their tube wells yielding water only during the rainy season and remaining dry throughout the rest of the year.

The rapid decline in groundwater levels, however, is not confined to the above-mentioned areas—it has impacted numerous other regions across the country, making crop cultivation increasingly challenging. Clearly, this situation has arisen due to our excessive reliance on groundwater and the lack of attention to alternative water sources. A 2022 study analysed 40 years of data from 465 shallow groundwater monitoring wells of the Bangladesh Water Development Board. It examined groundwater usage and levels during the dry season and revealed that due to extensive water usage, the groundwater level in two-thirds of the country is declining. In many areas, including Dhaka, the groundwater levels have fallen by an average of one to three meters.

For instance, groundwater levels in Godagari, Rajshahi, which were previously recharged to 16-18 meters during the rainy season in the 1980s, have not surpassed 16 meters since 2010. Due to a lack of water, the Barind Multipurpose Development Authority (BMDA) has limited Boro rice cultivation this year in eight upazilas across three districts of the Barind region—Rajshahi, Chapainawabganj, and Naogaon. In Kaliganj, Gazipur, the groundwater recharge levels have dropped from 6 meters in 1990 to 3 meters since 2015. In Dohar, Dhaka, recharge decreased from 4 meters to 3 meters by 2015.

The question is, what can the government do now to recharge the groundwater levels across the country, especially in the capital, where 70 percent of the water supply comes from underground sources? Our water experts provided solutions long ago: minimise groundwater extraction and utilise water from nearby rivers instead. Unfortunately, two crucial projects—the Sayedabad Water Treatment Plant (Phase-3) and the Meghna River Protection Master Plan—aimed at reducing the city's excessive dependence on groundwater, have been stalled for nearly a decade. The government must prioritise and expedite their implementation. Furthermore, it should consider various other methods, suggested by experts, for artificial groundwater recharging. Without immediate action, groundwater levels in Dhaka's densely populated areas could plummet to 100 meters by 2050. Therefore, the government needs to take urgent action to address the issue.​

 

[Saif]

New leadership, old rivers, and the long road to clean water

New efforts to clean Bangladesh's rivers offer hope, but community involvement and innovation are key.

www.thedailystar.net

New leadership, old rivers, and the long road to clean water

The cleanup efforts of rivers like the Buriganga need community involvement and innovative approaches. The photo was taken in March 2025. PHOTO: ANISUR RAHMAN

Of the 200 crore people around the world who lack access to safe drinking water, seven crore live in Bangladesh. That's 3.5 percent of the global population. In real terms, it means two out of every five people in this country rely on contaminated water.

Sanitation doesn't look any better. Forty-one percent of the population still doesn't have access to improved or basic sanitation. That's around seven crore people deprived of a basic human need, and constantly exposed to diseases, because they either don't know better or simply don't have access to anything better.

So, when we look at SDG 6—access to clean water and sanitation for all—it's no surprise that Bangladesh is way off track. With just five years left before 2030, Bangladesh's SDG tracker shows that, out of eight targets and 11 indicators, we're only likely to meet one: Indicator 6.1.1, "Proportion of population using safely managed drinking water services". That's under Target 6.1, which aims for universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all. Reality? Very different.

And I say "it's no surprise" because Bangladesh officially pledged to achieve the SDGs in 2015, when the UN member-states adopted the agenda. On paper, things looked okay. Rivers were declared as "living entities" (like in five other countries), monitoring bodies like the National River Conservation Commission (NRCC) were set up to track river health, a cluster of regulatory bodies were formed, and even the former prime minister herself was put in charge of the National Water Resource Council. This council was supposed to meet annually, review reports, and coordinate action. Guess how many times they met? Zero.

As of 2022, if you went to the Ministry of Water Resources or the NRCC, you wouldn't find updated databases or credible reporting on river conditions. Even in 2025, we still don't know how many rivers are intact.

What we do know is that Sheikh Hasina's government turned the whole system into a playground for syndicates. I spent two years reporting on rivers, and I can tell you most of the big stories weren't about solutions. They were about river dredging cartels selling sand to buyers with no names and no faces, pollution that no one was being held accountable for, floods, neglected communities, no awareness, no manpower, no drive to engage the people most affected—basically, the lack of everything.

Here's what surprised me, though. Usually, it's the people at the top eating the biggest slices of the cake. But when it came to looting public resources, the rot started from the bottom. Union parishad members, chairmen, and local muscle (many too dangerous to name) were cashing in. During the dry season, they'd create land out of embankments, blocking river flow, messing with navigation, and flooding low-lying areas.

When I asked an NRCC official how often the ministries sit for meetings, he said, "Barely, but they do sit." I asked why the minutes weren't uploaded to the website, he pointed to a lack of manpower. Then he paused and asked if what he was saying would be published. After I assured him it wouldn't, he sighed in relief, "Because we can't disclose how things operate. Especially in light of recent events." That "recent event" was the sudden removal of Dr Manjur Ahmed Chowdhury from his post as NRCC chairman. His termination came barely three weeks after he publicly criticised "a female minister from Chandpur." It was an unceremonious end to what was a brief but fierce tenure—one where, for once, someone dared to challenge powerful people for their alleged role in environmental damage. A rare exception in a long line of otherwise pliant former bureaucrats who usually lead these bodies.

The Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) official I spoke to carried the same weight of caution, careful with every word he said. But one thing stood out. The government only owned 15 dredgers, despite the ministry getting an annual budget in crores. Suddenly, it made sense why private companies get these dredging contracts, and then dredge wherever, however deep, for however long they please. No oversight. No accountability. No concern for communities. Just business.

These conversations made something painfully clear: the lack of freedom of speech has choked even the most basic forms of transparency. You can't even ask simple questions—like whether people are doing their jobs, whether meetings are happening, whether data is being tracked—without stepping on toes.

Thankfully though, we're now in the hands of someone capable. Adviser Syeda Rizwana Hasan, a woman on a mission, has taken on the mammoth task of showing the youth of Bangladesh what clean, pollution-free rivers look like. This is a journey I'm personally excited for.

Back in September, she pledged to clean up eight rivers in eight districts. But on February 11, she announced that the government had initiated a working plan to clean four major rivers surrounding the capital: Buriganga, Turag, Balu, and Shitalakkhya. Just days earlier, on February 2, in a step towards restoring Dhaka's waterways, three advisers of the interim government inaugurated excavation work in six canals. The project aims to improve water flow, combat pollution, and reclaim the canals from decades of neglect. These are essential moves, both environmentally and urbanly.

Besides this, the initial work of the long-awaited Teesta River project has finally resumed, bringing renewed hope to the communities living along its banks. If implemented well, the project will curb bank erosion, reclaim land, and store floodwater for use during the dry season.

If one takes a closer look, they'll notice how each of these moves directly addresses the indicators of SDG 6. If given five more years, at this rate, the environment adviser might meet her original goal—maybe not just eight rivers, but more. Only time will tell.

The only qualm I have with the current efforts, and one that could perhaps accelerate river cleanups even further, is the lack of community involvement and innovative approaches. Recently, Bangladesh sought US assistance for the restoration of the Buriganga River. But what would help more is collaboration with independent organisations. For example, River Cleanup, a Belgium-based international non-profit, structures its work around the theory of change and actively involves local communities while building awareness of plastic pollution. Or take the Seabin, an innovation by an Australian start-up that helps collect garbage before it enters the ocean. These are short-term solutions, but effective. If innovation is truly sought, it will be found. And if help is asked for, it should be specific and directed at organisations that can help solve our river problems in tangible ways.

This is not to say that we are not moving in the right direction; we are. This is just to say that the movement can grow louder—from a cautious step to a collective roar, one where communities care for rivers again and become part of the change. If anything, I'm just glad that we've gone from having no meetings to finding meeting minutes available on ministry websites.

The times, they are a-changin'. Thank goodness.

Nazifa Raidah is a journalist, researcher, and development practitioner.​

 

[Saif]

Govt should have earnestness, will to end river pollution

THE pollution of rivers, especially the four that surround the Dhaka city and generally all of them that flow through the Dhaka division, runs high whilst there may not be any rivers in outlying areas that are free of pollution. The environment department says that at least 1,659 industrial...

www.newagebd.net

Govt should have earnestness, will to end river pollution
23 March, 2025, 00:00

THE pollution of rivers, especially the four that surround the Dhaka city and generally all of them that flow through the Dhaka division, runs high whilst there may not be any rivers in outlying areas that are free of pollution. The environment department says that at least 1,659 industrial units discharge untreated waste water into canals, rivers and other water bodies. And most such factories are located in and around the Dhaka city and in other districts of the division. Official statistics show that 128 of the factories are located in the metropolitan area and 1,531 are in the division. Gazipur is reported to have 519 such factories, Dhaka 499, Narayanganj 380 and Narsingdi 129. No data on the situation in outlying areas are available. Yet, the data at hand show that river pollution mainly takes place around the Dhaka city. And, green campaigners put this down to the failure of authorities to deal with pollution sources. New sources of pollution keep coming up, compounding the situation. Experts say that industrial and municipal wastes majorly contribute to the pollution of rivers and water bodies. The situation has only worsened over the years in the absence of effective steps.

A December 2024 survey, which has published the report in January, has identified 1,024 points that discharge industrial effluents, municipal waste and sewage and are responsible for the pollution of the Buriganga, the Sitalakhya, the Turag and the Balu. The number of such points was 693 in 2022 and 608 in 2020. The growing number shows the inefficiency of all the public agencies that are mandated to stop river pollution. Or, this could well be the unwillingness of the agencies as corruption has all along been reported to be at the heart of the failures of the authorities to attend to the situation. Whilst many of the factories do not have any effluent treatment plants — and they are said to get away by somehow managing the administration — some of the factories that do have treatment plants are reported to be discharging the effluents without treatment so as to save money. Environmental officials list textile, washing, dyeing and pharmaceutical factories and hospitals and clinics that mostly do not have waste-water treatment plants. Experts say that some public agencies, especially the Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority, are major polluters of the rivers. The environment department says that it has served notices to the 1,659 factories, noting that it would take action if the units do not take measures. But such warnings in the past have not worked.

What the government, therefore, needs is the earnestness and will to end river pollution effectively and sustainably.​

 

[Saif]

Loss of glaciers threatens life on the planet

If the Amazon serves as the planet's lungs, glaciers provide the world population with freshwater that sustains life together with oxygen. A piece of highly disconcerting news is that following the ravage of the Amazon, the 275,000 glaciers in all 19 regions of the world have shrunk due to climate

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Loss of glaciers threatens life on the planet
Neil Ray
Published :
Mar 23, 2025 23:18
Updated :
Mar 23, 2025 23:18

If the Amazon serves as the planet's lungs, glaciers provide the world population with freshwater that sustains life together with oxygen. A piece of highly disconcerting news is that following the ravage of the Amazon, the 275,000 glaciers in all 19 regions of the world have shrunk due to climate change for the third consecutive year. Five of the last six years have witnessed the most rapid shrinking of glaciers, 2023 being the worst year for this alarming phenomenon. The year 2024 is the fourth worst in order since the maintenance of glacier record started in 1975.

The message is clear. Unless the sources of sweet water can be preserved from rapid melting, the survival of the humankind will be at stake. Called the Earth's frozen 'water tower', the glaciers together with ice caps store 68.7 per cent of the world's fresh water. But the ice sheets of the Antarctic and Greenland have 99 per cent share of the freshwater ice of the planet. This means that only 1.0 per cent of the freshwater obtained from the glaciers and ice caps has been in use for the more than 8.0 billion population of the world. Then only 1.2 per cent of the freshwater is surface water that meets most of life's requirements. According to the World Water Council, less than 1.0 per cent of freshwater is readily usable by people. No wonder that 2.0 billion people have no access to clean drinking water.

Indisputably, the global warming is responsible for rapid melting of the glaciers. Well, in summer the glaciers which are present in every continent except Australia must thaw in order to replenish the decline in water flows that starts in the winter when water freezes to make up for lost mass and continues up to late summer. If the environmental cycle did not maintain such a seasonal routine, life on the planet would be anything but what it is now. However, this routine is under threat with the excessive thawing of the glaciers and the loss of their masses. The world Meteorological Organisation (WMO), on calculation from data generated by the Swiss-based World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS) finds that the glaciers together lost 450 billion tons of mass in 2024 alone.

It unfolds a dire prospect, especially for some regions. Glaciers in western Canada, the United States, the Scandinavia, central Europe the Caucasus and New Zealand are predicted to disappear within this millennium if the global warming continues at the current rate. Earlier, similar apprehension was expressed over the sustainability of the Himalayan glaciers. Rapid melting of glaciers raises the spectre of great floods, landslides and avalanches. However, melting of a portion of the glaciers at a reasonable level is necessary to maintain the water levels in rivers and other water bodies. Rain and water from the glaciers together make up for the depletion of water in rivers that flow through the lower riparian regions to meet the seas or oceans. Seas and oceans send clouds that gather at the peaks of mountains to form ice caps and glaciers.

This simple but inexorable process gives life its sustenance on this planet. If this process is upset due to global warming, the future of mankind is sure to be imperilled. Scientists have tried to impress upon political leaders not only to lessen the use of fossil fuels responsible for producing greenhouse gas, but also focus on limiting temperature to 1.5 degree Celsius above the pre-industrial levels. But the developed industrial nations responsible for major environmental pollution are yet to comply with the Paris Agreement. With Trump back in power, the future of the agreement is in jeopardy because the man in White House does not believe in global warming and is unconvinced of the scientific evidences. His energy policy on massively using fossil fuels to strengthen American economy throws the prospect of lowering global temperature into uncertainty. Thus glaciers stand no chance of regaining their masses.​

 

[Saif]

‘Political backing’ fuels forest encroachment

The reserve forest in Majher Char under Patuakhali’s Rangabali upazila is depleting rapidly due to illegal logging.

www.thedailystar.net

Majher Char in Patuakhali

‘Political backing’ fuels forest encroachment

Workers carrying logs after cutting trees in the reserve forest in Majher Char under Patuakhali’s Rangabali upazila. Due to unabated illegal logging, the forest is on the verge of disappearing. PHOTO: STAR

The reserve forest in Majher Char under Patuakhali's Rangabali upazila is depleting rapidly due to illegal logging.

Allegedly, a local influential individual with political backing has been expanding his fish enclosures by encroaching on forest land through tree felling under the cover of darkness since 2020.

During a recent visit, this correspondent found clear evidence of deforestation, including tree stumps and aerial roots hastily covered with soil or hidden within loose branches and debris.

According to locals, Jewel Sikder has been occupying deforested land in the area to expand his fish enclosure. Initially, he operated under the political shelter of the Awami League, and even after the party's ouster last year, he has continued his activities under the banner of the BNP.

Recently, he has constructed dams, dug drainage canals, and installed culverts within the forest to facilitate water flow to his fish enclosure, locals said.

The local BNP leaders, however, claimed that Jewel had no affiliation with the party.

The reserve forest acts as a natural shield against storms and tidal surges, protecting the coastal region. If it disappears completely, the area will be left defenceless against such natural disasters, and wildlife will suffer due to habitat loss, said Zakir Hossain, a local fish trader, urging urgent action to stop the illegal logging and land grabbing.

Contacted, Jewel Sikder refuted the allegations, claiming he was cultivating fish on land either legally recorded in his name or leased by him. He alleged that a group with malicious intent was making false accusations to harm his reputation.

The Majher Char Reserve Forest falls under the jurisdiction of Kankunipara Forest Camp of Rangabali Forest Range.

Narayan Chandra Majumder, in-charge of the camp, said officials had found evidence of forest grabbing during a site visit following complaints.

A drainage canal was discovered inside the forest, and the fish enclosure had been expanded across a 100-metre stretch of illegally occupied land. The matter has been reported to higher authorities, he said.

Md Shafiqul Islam, divisional forest officer in Patuakhali, said an inquiry has been launched, and the assistant conservator of forest has been directed to investigate. If the allegations are proven, legal action will be taken, he added.Rangabali Upazila Nirbahi Officer Md Iqbal Hasan said he was aware of the situation and that higher authorities would be informed for necessary action.​