Blog Action Day: Bangladesh and Environment

(First published in E-Bangladesh)



Yesterday was the Blog action day, a day when bloggers around the web were unite to emphasize the important issue 'the environment' that people tend to ignore. The campaign asked every blogger around the world to post about the environment in their own way and relating to their own local or international topic.

Why is the Blog day important? Kevin Stirtz writes in the American Chronicle:

Blog Action Day is important because it shows us the power, energy and diversity of many people to voluntarily propose ideas and start conversations about an important topic. It should add great value to the current conversations about how to protect our environment.

Almost 2000 Blogs:

19,974 Blogs have registered to be part of this campaign. You can get the list of the participants from here. Google Blog search lists around 13000 of the blog posts on Blog Action Day.

Here is a list of Environmental Blogs furthering the cause. Global Voices Online, Green Options, and Shouting Match have posted roundups on Blog Action day posts.

Bangladesh and Environment:

Most of the Bangladeshi Blogs were almost silent about this campaign. Probably because people in Bangladesh are battered with lot of issues like poverty, political instability and natural disaster, 'the environment' is one issue that seldom gets priority.

We have seen Bangladesh being subject to many environmental constraints which led to augmentation of natural disasters and diseases in mass scale.

The Farakka Barrage in India and the unilateral withdrawal of Ganges water during dry season by India resulted serious adverse effects on environment, agriculture, industries, fisheries, navigation, river regime, salinity contamination in the surface and ground water in the southwestern and western areas of Bangladesh covering almost 20% of its area.

Clean water source has been a perennial problem of Bangladesh. Starting in the 1970s aid agencies such as the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) had built shallow wells throughout the country to help provide a safe source of drinking water to Bangladesh's population. However in the 1990s it was discovered that many of these wells were contaminated by arsenic, a poison that accumulates naturally in Bangladesh's alluvial soils. According to a World Bank estimate 25 percent of the country's 4 million wells may be contaminated by arsenic. Without a way to filter the water from arsenic these wells have become a nightmare for Bangladeshi villagers.(Source)

After the great flood of 1988 developments of a damn built around greater Dhaka city is protecting the capital but the rest of the country is still prone to floods which destroy millions of dollars worth infrastructure each year. Many unfortunates have to start again after each flood as their tangible belongings are destroyed.



During late Eighties and early Nineties we have seen many cyclone shelters were built up with the help of Saudi Arabian grants. But many of them are in shabby conditions today. We rarely see development budgets being used to repairs and maintenance of these shelters.

Bangladesh is located on a tectonically active plate and the potential for magnitude 8 or greater earthquakes on the nearby Himalayan front is very high. An earthquake in excess of 6.5 (Richter scale) will cause a disaster in the densely populated Dhaka city.

There is a widespread theory that:

If the sea rises by a metre — as some scientists say it will by 2100 — a quarter of Bangladesh will be submerged, forcing 30 to 40 million people from their homes.

I think Bangladesh is also lacking behind in planning a protection measure against this threat of Global Warming. This just shows that how relevant the issue is for Bangladesh. If the Netherlands can reclaim massive land from below sea level Bangladesh should also be able to take measures well in advance. However the Netherlands has also reasons to bother about it. Watch what Dr. Patrick Dixon has to say about it.


Bangladesh has also some achievements in protecting the environment. Its rural economy is still driven by agriculture. It has plenty of natural gas reserve which have been put to good use as fuels (CNG) for automobiles, cooking, electricity generating, industrial use etc. Use of polythene bags are banned in the country.

Although our main target is to reduce poverty and achieve a sustainable growth and development still there are lots of environmental issue we need to address.

Today starts another relevant campaign called stand up and speak out against poverty. I hope you will do your part as a responsible world citizen.

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Netherlands in a day

Goethe once said that traveling is like gambling. Because if you expect less, you receive, more or less than what you hoped for and you win.

I did not know what to expect when I planned the one day trip to the Netherlands. We had some relatives from Bangladesh who were keen to visit a neighboring country. I promised them that I will take them to the land of the flowers. But they were just a month late for the tulip season. Still they had Netherlands in mind and I was not sure whether the one day trip will be worthwhile.

So I gambled and invested in a portable satellite navigation system. Believe me if you are a stranger driving in a land you have never been before it is the best companion you could ever wish for. It could navigate to almost all of the remotest of destinations I entered from the ADAC (automobile club) tour guide tips.

We started from Berlin in the morning and the sky was gloomy. It drizzled in some parts as we drove through the middle of Germany. But the sky cleared up as we approached the Netherlands border. You will hardly notice the border crossing because there is only a tiny board welcoming visitors to Netherlands. And you will soon notice the difference. Drivers get very indulged in driving fast in Germany thanks to limitless Autobahns in many parts. As soon as you enter the Netherlands, the speed limit 120km/h in highways seem suffocating. My navigator was frequently screaming "watch out" as the speed limit warning mode was on. But thanks to it I did not get a ticket.

We arrived at a hotel near Schiphol airport (Amsterdam) on around 4:00PM. After relaxing a bit, we headed for Haarlem, nicknamed 'Bloemenstad', the city of the flowers. We wanted to go to the Grote Markt. But the navigator got a little confused because of limited access in the narrow roads. It was Sunday evening and almost everything was closed but we enjoyed the scenic view of the city. The old architecture and the serenity of lives around the canal were simply superb. Until the 16th century the water for the famous beer industries was taken from this canal.

So we proceeded to our next destination Ijmuiden, the main town of the municipality of Velsen. It was not a tourist destination until recently. There is a marina and there are some beautiful Dutch architectures and landscape sceneries. We stopped at the Ferry terminal for some tea and got the glimpse of this ocean liner. The port activities were pleasing. Everybody posed in front of the liner as if we will be boarding on it soon.

But the best part of the road from Ijmuiden towards the beach town Zandvoort were the painting perfect houses. I have seen many houses fresh from the canvass of a famous painting in some rural parts of Netherlands. Some houses (like the one in the picture) had customized flora and fauna which can easily win competitions. I wished I were not driving and recording this all with the camera. But I am sure even cameras won't be able to replicate the beauties my eyes have seen.

Next stop Zandvoort is famous for its sandy beach and its famous automobile racing circuit. The interesting thing of this beach is it has private houses along the beach where you can spend the holiday and watch the waves through glass wall of your living room. The marine drive was pleasing. We learnt later that it also has a nudist beach. Then we proceeded for the Tulip gardens situated near the town Lisse. We tried to go near Keukenhof, the center of famous tulip gardens but our navigator lost its way somewhere. Nonetheless we saw some vacant tulip gardens which are overall in the locality.

We headed for the hotel as our tour ended for the day. The ubiquitous Mcdonalds took away our worries about looking for a dinner in a Sunday night.

The next morning started with the tour of Amsterdam. The town looked less attractive than those beauties we saw yesterday. And its more like going through the motion as a typical tourist. Watching the Queens palace being restored with building equipments was not something you would expect.

I so longed for a boat ride along the canals of Amsterdam (something I missed during my last trip to Amsterdam). But my entourage declined as they had kids suffering from cold. So probably this will bring me back to Amsterdam again. We had so little time and could not visit any museum. Our venture was only limited to pure sightseeing and roaming around souvenir shops. We stopped briefly in Prinsen Gracht and Margere bridge. We had to return on Monday. So at around noon we started towards Berlin.

On the way we touched Almere, a city on the reclaimed land, several meters under sea level. The dam on Ijsselmeer made this reclamation possible. Although though for using these lands for agriculture, it is now used as a city. It brags to become a metropolitan like Amsterdam some day. The first house was finished in 1976 and the architecture are modern. We saw offices of multinationals like IBM and Pioneer there.

We came back to Berlin at around 8:00 PM and the 1500 km journey in 36 hours had ended. I have won the gamble.

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