Unheard Voices

Climate change has been identified as the most significant threat to the ability of the planet to sustain life. It is damaging to the world’s ecosystem and is set to cause a global environmental disaster. The geographical location of Bangladesh, locked between the Himalayas in the north and the Bay of Bengal in the south, makes the country the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The rapid melting of the Himalayan glaciers has added momentum to the currents of the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers, causing extensive flooding. Global warming coupled with rising sea levels in the Bay of Bengal have been responsible for the increased intensity of cyclones, monsoon rain and land erosion in recent years.

As part of it annual project on raising awareness on climate change impact on Bangladesh and South Asia, Drishtipat London is launching a blog/portal site today that is going to exclusively focus on the impact of climate change in South Asia, specially Bangladesh. The threat of 1/3 of Bangladesh getting wiped away and creating 125 million climate refugees are very real. As expatriate Bangladeshis, it is our collective responsibility, to highlight the injustice of the whole issue where Bangladesh will pay the price of Western excesses that is destroying our planet.

Visit the website http://isanybodylistening.info today and spread the word to others.

Zafar Sobhan

He who saves one life, saves the world entire.
–Talmud

A traveler was walking along a beach when he saw a woman scooping up starfish off the sand and tossing them into the waves. Curious, he asked her what she was doing. The woman replied: “When the tide goes out, it leaves these starfish stranded on the beach. They will dry up and die before the tide comes back in, so I am throwing them back into the sea where they can live.”
The traveler then asked her: “But this beach is miles long and there are hundreds of stranded starfish, many will die before you reach them — do you really think throwing back a few starfish is really going to make a difference?”
The woman picked up a starfish and looked at it, then she threw it into the waves and said: “It makes a difference to this one.”
–Popular fable

It’s a never-ending story: floods, cyclones, death, destruction. Inside the country, the events had a deadening familiarity. The days of foreboding as, literally, the storm clouds gathered The heightening anxiety with the periodic escalation of the official danger level. The collective holding of our breath and sense of impending doom as the storm hit. And the desperate rush for shelter and safety before, during, and after, that sadly left far too many behind and unprovided for.

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It seems like the other day when our very own Mohammed Yunus won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize to become the first Bangladeshi to reach that stature. In reality, a year has gone by and we witnessed a situation escalating almost to a civil war, a state of emergency which is still in effect, an army backed caretaker government taking over the control of the government with a promise to bring mass reforms to the nation, a terrible flood, rise and fall of many powerful men and women and many other myriad events in Bangladesh.

During my morning commute today, I got to know from radio news that Al Gore (former vice-president and presidential candidate) was nominated as the 2007 Nobel Peace Price winner for his climate change campaign. First thing that came to my mind was “global warming” and then “Bangladesh”. It is without a doubt that Bangladesh is one of the top countries to suffer the consequences of climate change or global warming if we are not seeing some of the affects already. Inadvertently but undoubtedly, the Noble Peace Prize touched Bangladesh profoundly two years in a row.

Al Gore is a man with probably equal share of critics and exponents from the left to the right. Leaving aside you political view on Gore, he deserves accolades for bringing global awareness to this very serious global issue. We have not seen much needed broadened and elevated conversation on global warning until recently and if you recall it was at the top of recently concluded UN general assembly meeting. It is hard to believe the number of people still denying global warming as a scientific fact – it is like believing the Earth is flat simply because we can’t see the arch. Congratulations to Al Gore for his campaign that directly affects millions of lives in Bangladesh.

Suddenly the water turns black and all the dead fishes, alligators and sharks start floating at the rivers adjacent to the Bay of Bengal in the Sundarbans (The last remaining unadulterated forest in Bangladesh). A commercial liner is reported to be in trouble nearby. Blogger AsifY posts a blog on this issue. Not a single reader takes part in the discussion, while hundreds of comments flood the posts on politics, the leaders and their sons. And nobody in Dhaka chattering class makes a single sound about it.

All the sewer wastes of 7 million Dhakaites are collected, processed in 16 large lagoons near Dhaka. Many years ago, some evil traders start raising fish in those sewer collecting depots. These fish are sold in Dhaka markets for years. Government decides to stop it. They poison the fishes and try to collect the dead fishes for burning. Suddenly thousands of local people storm the area, battle with the police, loot the fishes, and run back with the poisoned dead fishes grown in sewer lagoon.

Probably the cry of hunger was a little too intense.

While all these happen, the beastly cry at Dhaka zoo gets louder for a couple of days. As a result of some government bureaucratic entanglement, administrative inefficiency and extreme indifference to the core duty of the job, the animals of Dhaka zoo starve for 3 days. Apparently the budget to buy meat etc for the animal needed some signature at the secretariat. The agriculture advisor, upon hearing the story from media men, call in the zoo officials, some emergency fund is managed and several cows are collected from nearby Savar Dairy farm to feed the zoo animals. These animals would have fed themselves if they were allowed to live in their natural habitat. Now as their natural habitat has been destroyed and they are held captive, it is the responsibility of the captors to feed these animals.

And all these happen when this glowing Dhaka breaks into the list of top ten countries in high tech mobile phone sells.

জুন ১৩ ও জুন ১৪, ২০০৭ তারিখে প্রথম আলোর প্রথম পাতায় এসেছে আবাসন শিল্পের কর্ণধারদের নিয়ে প্রতিবেদন। রিয়েল এস্টেট ও গৃহায়ন শিল্পপতিদের সংগঠন রিহ্যাব অর্থ উপদেষ্টা মির্জা আজিজ এর কাছে অনুরোধ নিয়ে গিয়েছিলেন সাম্প্রতিক বাজেটে ঘোষিত একটি রদ করা রীতি আরো এক বছরের জন্যে চালু রাখতে। রীতিটি হচ্ছে, নির্দিষ্ট হারে কর দিলে জমি বা বাড়ি ক্রয়ে ব্যয়িত টাকার উৎস সম্পর্কে কিছু জানতে চাওয়া হয় না। সোজা কথায়, কালো টাকার মালিকদের নিশ্চন্ত মনে আরো এক বছর জমিজমা ঘরবাড়ি কেনাকাটা করে টাকার রংটা পাল্টে ফেলার সুযোগ দেয়া হোক। অর্থ উপদেষ্টা সাফ না বলেছেন। রিহ্যাবের কর্তারা আশঙ্কা প্রকাশ করেছেন, তাঁদের শিল্প মারাত্মক ধ্বসের মুখোমুখি হতে পারে। তার পরদিন এসেছে আবাসন শিল্পের মোঘল বসুন্ধরার ব্যবসায়িক অপচর্চা নিয়ে কিছু কথা। বসুন্ধরার কর্ণধার বর্তমানে প্রবাসে আছেন, তাঁর সম্পর্কে রাজনীতির পান্ডাদের উৎকোচ প্রদান থেকে শুরু করে পুত্রের বিরুদ্ধে হত্যার অভিযোগকে ঘুষ দিয়ে ধামাচাপা দেয়ার তথ্য বেরিয়ে এসেছে প্রাক্তন স্বরাষ্ট্র প্রতিমন্ত্রী লুৎফুজ্জামান বাবরের সাম্প্রতিক রিমান্ড জেরায়।

প্রতিবেদন পড়ে যা বোঝা যায় তা হচ্ছে, আবাসন শিল্পের হর্তাকর্তারা অত্যন্ত প্রভাবশালী (হয়তো ঘুষ হিসেবে প্লট/ফ্ল্যাট/বাড়ির আবেদন নগদ টাকার চেয়ে বেশি), এবং তাঁদের শিল্পের স্ফীতি বহুলাংশে কালো টাকার ওপর নির্ভরশীল। এবং টাকার ব্যাপারে বর্ণবাদী না হতে যে আহ্বান তাঁরা জানিয়েছেন, তা সরাসরি দুর্নীতিবাজদের সহায়তা করবে।

প্রাক্তন অর্থমন্ত্রী সাইফুর রহমান কালো টাকা সাদা করার জন্যে সে টাকা গৃহায়নে বিনিয়োগের সুযোগ চালু করেছিলেন। তার আগে টাকার ধোলাই করতে হতো শিল্পকারখানা খুলে (যেখানো মানুষের কর্মসংস্থানের সুযোগ তৈরি হয়)। রাতারাতি ধোপাবাড়ির ঠিকানা বদল হওয়ার কারণে অঢেল কালো টাকার স্রোত ধেয়ে চলে আবাসন শিল্পের দিকে। অর্থনীতির সরল সূত্র অনুযায়ী সীমিত সরবরাহের বিপরীতে বর্ধনশীল চাহিদা অল্প সময়ের মধ্যেই আবাসন শিল্পের পণ্যগুলির মূল্য বাড়িয়ে তোলে দেড় থেকে দুইগুণ।

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Earlier this month life all over Bangladesh had become unbearable with scorching heat that soared over 40 degree Celsius, not very normal for Bangladesh. People from all walks of life had their share of suffering though the worst sufferers were those in the bottom of the barrel as usual – farmers, day laborers, rickshaw pullers, hawkers and likes.
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An incredible new piece on climate change linking it directly to river erosions in Bangladesh. Drishtipat London is going to work on the issue of climate change this year to raise awareness on west’s responsibility on this and the danger it brings towards the future of Bangladesh. Also another goal is connect people working outside Bangladesh on this issue with the folks in Bangladesh who are working at the grass root level. If you are interested to volunteer to this cause, please write to info AT london DOT drishtipat dot org

The once lush island of Aralia is disappearing under rising waters as flooding becomes more frequent, temperatures increase and disease kills four people a month

It is hard to gauge the exact extent of the local devastation caused by climate change because severe flooding and catastrophic river erosion are part of every day life in rural Bangladesh. But the island of Aralia, in the Haor flood plain of north-east Bangladesh has, in the past 50 years, diminished to a fifth of its size, according to its older residents Ask anyone over 40 about the island of their childhoods and they describe fertile fields, green trees and animals, an island of plenty, where children grew up healthy and went to school. Today, Shamola’s misfortunes are becoming the norm as flooding and river erosion become ever more common. Non-government agencies working with Bangladesh’s poor, as well as scientists throughout the world, are convinced that climate change is to blame for the dramatic increase in this flooding.

With a population of 150 million, Bangladesh is the world’s most densely populated country. A series of straddling deltas of some of the world’s biggest rivers, Bangladesh is at risk not only from rising sea levels, but the increased flow of water caused by more rain and glacial melt from the Himalayas. At this rate of flooding and erosion, 20 per cent of Bangladesh could be under water by 2100. All this despite the average Bangladeshi using just one tenth of the carbon emissions of any European, and one 25th of the average citizen of the United States.

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How does such a small place hold so much? You worry that it will burst. But your worry is misplaced. You should worry that it will sink. For as the sea level rises, its waters will flow upward like fingers into a glove, turning the sweet river water into salt. The salt will destroy the crops and kill the fish and raze the forests. At the same time, the Himalayan peaks will melt, and they, too, will flow into the country. The rising sea and the melting mountains will meet on this tiny patch of the world, and the people who strain at its seams will drown with it, or be blown away to distant shores, casualties and refugees by the millions.

Full Article in New York Times by Tahmima

Bangladesh: At the mercy of climate change — Justin Huggler in the Independent (UK)

The trees in the Sundarbans have suddenly started dying. And not just that: they have started dying in a way nobody has seen before, from the top down. Nobody is sure what the cause is, but the country’s leading scientists think the trees are dying because, in recent years, the water has turned from fresh to salty. The Sundarbans is a massive mangrove swamp, and the sea has begun encroaching. What we are seeing may be one of the first casualties of rising sea levels caused by global warming.

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