National
3 years ago

Some 69,000 hectares of Bangladesh land used for non-agricultural purposes a year

File photo. (Collected)
File photo. (Collected)

Published :

Updated :

An average of 69 thousand hectares of arable land in the country is being used for non-agricultural purposes every year, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister Md Shahab Uddin said.

"Work is underway to create a rich database for determining the indicators or areas of mitigation of land degradation in Bangladesh and for effective monitoring and evaluation planning. And, the government is working in a coordinated manner to reduce land degradation to zero using sustainable land use technology as planned," he added.

The environment minister said these while speaking as the chief guest at the third interim workshop of a project titled "Establishing National Land Use and Land Degradation Profile Towards Mainstreaming Sustainable Land Management Practices in Sector Policies" at the Department of Environment in Dhaka on Thursday.

As a signatory to the Rio Convention, Bangladesh is committed to preventing desertification, land degradation and drought, biodiversity conservation and climate change.

He said the project is being implemented to create sustainable land use data to update the land use map, identify the causes and indicators of land degradation, prevent erosion, mitigation or reuse.

Based on the information generated, it will formulate the roadmap for building a promised decay-free Bangladesh by 2030, the minister mentioned.

The Department of Agricultural Extension, the Soil Resources Development Institute, the Barind Multipurpose Development Authority and the Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services are working in partnership with the Department of Environment as part of the integrated initiative.

Investment in degraded land will create local employment and provide an opportunity for the people of this country to fight for survival, which in turn will strengthen national security and sustainable future development, Shahab Uddin hoped.

Poor people will have no choice but to immigrate. We need to ensure the use of land consciously to meet the demand for vital elements of life, said speakers.

Deputy Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Begum Habibun Nahar, Secretary Ziaul Hasan, Project Director Dr Muhammad Sohrab Ali and Project Coordinator Jalal Mohammad Sohaib spoke at the workshop chaired by Director General of the Department of Environment AKM Rafique Ahammed.

[email protected]

Share this news