CA defends local polls plan
June 30, 2008
Chief adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed Saturday defended the Election Commission’s schedule to hold local government polls ahead of the year-end national elections.
“People want the local poll before the national one,” the CA said at the regional dialogue with local people in Chandanaish, 45 kilometres south of the port city of Chittagong.
“It’s not possible to establish democracy without strengthening the local government. Good governance is just as necessary at grassroots level as at the centre,” he said.
Fakhruddin said the present government has been working to cut poverty and set up a corruption-free society.
“Our goal is to transfer power to an elected government through a free, fair and peaceful election.”
Describing the EC as a completely independent and neutral organisation, the CA said the government would provide the Election Commission with cooperation to hold the elections.
Fakhruddin hoped that those to be elected in the next election would further consolidate the democratic system and work for the welfare of people.
“Preparation for the national polls set for December was almost complete,” the CA said.
The chief adviser said a new law was on the cards to bar “graft convicts” from contesting national polls.
The dialogue was joined by 318 local representatives from different professions, including doctor, lawyer, teacher, NGO worker and businessman.
The regional dialogue started in Chandanaish at 9.30.
Prior to the talks, Fakhruddin said: “Political parties are not our opponents. None of us will take part in the next election.”
Fakhruddin hoped that a democratic government would be established thanks to the participation of all political parties in the year-end elections.
The CA arrived in Chandanaish at 8.45am by helicopter to join the dialogue that started at 9.30am.
Law adviser AF Hassan Ariff, communications adviser Ghulam Quadir, LGRD adviser Anwarul Iqbal and commerce adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman also joined the talks.
The second part of the dialogue in the Chittagong region was scheduled to start at the city’s Engineers Institute.
New DUET VC soon to be announced: adviser
June 30, 2008
The president is expected to appoint a new vice chancellor to Dhaka University of Engineering and Technology any day, the education adviser said Monday, reports bdnews24.com.
The search committee, formed to nominate candidates for VCs, pro-VCs and treasurers of public universities, made a list of three potential candidates for the post in a meeting Monday.
“A primary list of three has been made out of 26 applications for the post of DUET VC,” adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman told reporters at his office.
“President Iajuddin Ahmed will select and appoint one of the three for the post any day,” he added.
The adviser said the search committee in its next meeting, slated for June 16, would select candidates for VCs of six other public universities, from applications following the countrywide advertisement for VC appointments of seven public universities.
Some 325 applications for the seven VC posts have been submitted so far, Hossain Zillur said.
“We have also finalised new regulations regarding recruitment — who may be appointed and by what process,” said the adviser.
According to the new regulations, those barred from applying include anyone who has previously been removed from the post of VC, those who have no experience in teaching at university level and those who have applied for more than one post.
The six public universities, in addition to DUET, are Sher-e-Bangla Agriculture University, Khulna University, National University, Jessore University of Science and Technology, Rajshahi University of Engineering and Technology and Dinajpur Haji Danesh Science and Technology University.
“Apart from these seven universities, we will advertise for VCs of Mymensingh Agricultural University, Patuakhali University of Science and Technology and Noakhali University of Science and Technology very soon,” said Hossain Zillur.
Oil market oversupplied but not wise to cut: Qatar
June 30, 2008
Oil markets are oversupplied but it would not be wise for any OPEC exporter to tighten the taps given the risk of exacerbating prices, Qatari Oil Minister Abdullah al-Attiyah said on Sunday.
Attiyah’s remarks came after Libya’s most senior oil official said on Thursday he was studying the possibility of reducing output in response to a U.S. threat to sue OPEC members, although he said the North African country had no concrete plans to do so for now.
“It is not wise today to cut supplies even though there is a surplus because we do not want to create a psychological problem,” Attiyah told Reuters. “I’m not in favour of it at all. We want to try to help to ease the psychological heat.” But the Qatari minister criticised a move by U.S. politicians to sue the Organization of the Oil Exporting Countries if the oil club did not pump an amount of oil that Washington sees sufficient.
“The Congress should look to increase exploration inside the United States,” Attiyah said. “It is strange to ask what I should produce. It’s an issue of sovereignty.”
The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill allowing the Justice Department to sue OPEC members for limiting oil supplies and working together to set crude prices.
The Senate has yet to vote on it and the White House has said it would veto the bill.
Attiyah said if enacted, the measure could create a problem for the US market as many producers would avoid US buyers.
“You will see a lot of oil suppliers will avoid the American market and you will create another big problem.” OPEC’s biggest exporter Saudi Arabia has announced plans to hike output to 9.7 million barrels per day (bpd) — the fastest pace in decades-but some consumer economies blame the oil exporter group for doing too little to combat the rally.
Oil producers have to consider their reservoirs’ productivity for the long run and not only supply and demand factors as they manage production levels, said Attiyah.
“Sometimes I have to think carefully in terms of reservoir management. I do not want to damage all the reservoirs. We produce to satisfy the whole world but not at the cost of our reserves,” he said.
Record oil prices are putting pressure on the global economy, saddling companies and consumers around the world with higher energy costs and triggering protests from farmers in Spain to students in Nepal. Attiyah said oil prices were detached from market fundamentals.
“There is no coordination between supplies and the oil price. We believe that the market is not facing any shortage of supplies at the moment. There are some cargoes in floating storage. More crude will not benefit the market.
“I never get a call from my customers asking for more supply but we always hear concerns about high oil prices. This shows there is no correlation between the oil price and supplies.”
Major G8 invest $10b a year to fight global warming
June 30, 2008
The Group-of-Eight industrialised nations will jointly invest more than 10 billion dollars a year on research and development of technology to combat global warming, a report said on Sunday.
The plan, including research on underground storage of carbon dioxides, is included in a draft joint statement on economic policy to be adopted at the G8 summit scheduled for July 7-9 in Japan, the business daily Nikkei said. Climate change will dominate the summit which will bring together leaders from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United States to the northern Japan lakeside resort of Toyako.
The Nikkei said it had obtained the outline of the draft statement.
According to the draft, the G8 leaders will also seek an agreement on setting country-by-country goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions over the medium term from 2013, the daily said. They will also express their determination to avert a global economic crisis through coordinated efforts to deal with the impact of soaring oil and food prices, it added.
On July 9, the Major Economies Meeting on Energy Security and Climate Change (MEM), a 16-nation forum including China and India, will be held on the sidelines of the G8 summit and issue a separate statement, the daily said.
The draft of the G8 economic statement points to the importance of imposing a long-term goal for cutting global emissions.
But, because Japan and Europe differ with the United States over long- term numerical targets, a final decision on the question may be left to the G8 leaders when they meet at Toyako, the daily said. Japan and Europe want gas emissions to be halved around the world by 2050, while the United States is cautious about establishing such an ambitious goal, it added.
The Nikkei said that the joint statement will clearly state the commitment of the G8 nations to setting quantitative goals in the future although it is unlikely to contain specific figures.
SAARC can act as one on climate change
June 30, 2008
For the first time in history, humans are affecting the ecological balance of not just a region but the entire world, all at once.
Ripan Kumar Biswas
Bangladesh will return to the democratic process as soon as feasible and all political parties, government, and general people will be united forgetting all enmity to take the country forward. India’s government and its communist allies will find a suitable solution over a civilian nuclear deal with the United States to continue their coalition in the parliament. To lessen tension between Pakistan and Afghanistan over Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s comment’s that he will send troops to Pakistan to attack militants; both countries will sit to resolve the problems through dialogue.
But climate is not something that we can fix whenever we want. Because most climate models predict gradual future changes to climate, related to the steadily increasing greenhouse gas concentrations and carbon emissions. But ice and sediment core records reveal that, in the past, climate has changed abruptly – possibly in as little as 10 to 20 years. Such rapid change in the future could make prevention and adaptation strategies difficult and expensive to implement.
We are altering the environment far faster than we can possibly predict the consequences. Comparable climate shifts have happened before, but over tens of centuries, not tens of years. The unprecedented rapid change could accelerate the already high rate of species extinction as plants and animals fail to adapt quickly enough. For the first time in history, humans are affecting the ecological balance of not just a region but the entire world, all at once.
The alarmists in the global warming debate have had their say—over and over again, in every newspaper in the country practically every day and in countless news reports and documentary films. They have dominated the media’s coverage of this issue. There in an increasing need for governments, organizations, businesses, and even individuals to understand and help tackle the issue as climate change is one of the biggest challenges we are facing today.
In view of the growing demand to form a regional action plan for adaptation to climate change and mobilizing funds for the purpose, environment ministers of South Asia are going to sit for the first-ever such meeting in Dhaka on July 3, 2008. Before that, according to the 29th session of the SAARC’s council of ministers in New Delhi in December, 2007, an expert-level meeting will be preceded on July 1 and 2, who will make an in-depth assessment of the probable impact of climate change on the region and will suggest measures to tackle the situation through regional cooperation. A fund titled “Fund for Climate Change” has also been proposed to seek funds from donor agencies whose representatives have been invited to the meeting.
Climate change affects us everyday, everywhere. Hundreds of people were reported dead and a passenger ferry MV Princess of Stars having onboard around 700 passengers and 121 crew members capsized due to typhoon Frank (Fengshen) in Philippines on June 22, 2008. Kansas, Indiana, and Iowa had been heavily affected by floods on June 6-13, 2008. Rising flood waters swamped the central US river city, forcing residents to flee their homes and officials to abandon city hall amid a wider crisis that had left 20 dead. On November 15, 2007, the category 4 cyclone Sidr in Bangladesh uprooted more than 3,153 lives and unknown number of homes.
Humans are changing the Earth’s climate so fast and devouring resources so voraciously that the survival of the world’s ecosystems and of humanity itself is at stake. According to a German Scientists, the climate will be changing more quickly in this century than it ever has in the recent history of the earth. Besides various organizations of UN, governments of different countries, non-government organizations, scientists, or individuals, many regional organizations throughout the world are now working together to cope with climate change as most of the times in any natural disaster, neighboring countries in the region are usually effected.
2008 will be a decisive year in the battle against climate change. Hopefully, it will see us forge an international consensus so an agreement can be reached in Copenhagen in 2009 that will allow us to build on the Kyoto Protocol. Although there are many disputes among them, but one of the main themes and objectives of the 34th G8 summit, which is to take place in Tokyo, Japan on July 7-9, 2008, is environment and climate change. The economic impact of climate change, rising food prices, and a broad range of other trade, growth and development issues were discussed at this year’s OECD’s Ministerial Council Meeting at OECD headquarters in Paris on 4-5 June 2008. World leaders will lay the groundwork for a global agreement through the 14th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Puzon, Poland on December 1-12, 2008.
After a two-day summit in Brussels, Belgium on March 14, 2008, EU (European Union) leaders declared an ambitious plan to fight climate change and agreed to implement a 20% cut in greenhouse gases by 2020, compared with 1990 levels. The EU leaders also agreed to consider cutting value-added tax (VAT) on environmentally-friendly domestic products, which aims to increase the use of so-called green goods. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer urged the 26 member nations to bear climate change in mind as one of the key elements as it will lead to international tensions and conflicts over resources, water, farming lands and will also increase migration.
According to the World Bank climate change expert Richard Damania, the poorest of the poor in South Asia are the most impacted by climate change. The impacts of higher temperatures, more extreme weather events such as floods, cyclone, severe drought, and sea level rise are already felt in South Asia and will continue to intensify. “We are going to see the wet parts of South Asia become wetter causing flooding and affecting more people. We will also see the arid areas getting drier. This will hurt the poor the most,” he said.
Bangladesh is set to disappear under the waves by the end of the century, said US government’s NASA space agency. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicted that Bangladesh is on course to lose 17 per cent of its land and 30 per cent of its food production by 2050. The country has already begun to feel the effects of the climate change as flood periods have become longer and the cyclones that hit the country cause greater devastation. As sea-levels rise, the IPCC warned that 35 million refugees could flee Bangladesh’s flooded delta by 2050.
The impact of climate change on India, a hotter and poorer country, is likely to be worse. According to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, India’s agriculture will suffer more than any other country’s. Assuming a global temperature increase of 4.4°C over cultivated areas by 2080, India’s agricultural output is projected to fall by 30-40%.
The 2004 tsunami is the deadliest in recorded history. In the aftermath of the quake resultant tsunami waves killed over 280,000 people in towns and villages along the coasts of the Indian Ocean. Over 3 million survivors had their livelihoods destroyed. India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Maldives, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Somalia were affected. It killed over 40,000 people in Sri Lanka. Thousands of those missing were never recovered. Sri Lanka expects that over the next two decades the sea-level will rise by half a meter with dry areas becoming drier and wet areas becoming wetter, leading to floods in some areas and drought in others.
Maldives, which is made up of 1191 islands, is a very low-lying island nation. During the past decade, the sea on average in the Maldives has risen by one millimeter every year; that means one centimeter in ten years. Since 80% of its islands are no more than 1m above sea level, within 100 years the Maldives could become uninhabitable.
Governments of these regional countries are trying to find some way to address the climate change. For the first time, government of Bangladesh allocated Tk 300 crore to create a special fund for enhancing public adaptability to face the challenges of climate change. India has adopted a vaunted policy, the National Action Plan on Climate Change and formed a powerful council of ministers, bureaucrats, scientists, and businessmen to co-operate on the issue. Recently, the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources in Sri Lanka launched a Climate Change Secretariat and the Sri Lanka Carbon Fund. Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency is working to improve and protect the environment. But together, they can take a common stance on the climate change issue.
No doubt that SAARC could be more effective for its geopolitical relationship with surrounding countries and emerge as regional strength. But since its inception on December 8, 1985, SAARC has not been able to take up such critical issues. It has shown little concern for the regional political crisis that climate change threatens.
(Ripan Kumar Biswas is a freelance writer based in New York. Dateline: New York; June 28, 2008. E-mail: Ripan.Biswas@yahoo.com)
Tourism
June 30, 2008
Nowadays, tourism has become an industry all over the world. Tourism can go a long way to developing our country. Bangladesh has a golden opportunity to earn from this unexplored sector. And naturally our country is endowed with enchanting beauty having a colourful landscape. We have the world’s largest sea beach, the Sundarbans, Hill tracts of Chittagong and Sylhet, mighty rivers, Bay of Bengal etc. As a result, tourists from every corner of the world visit our country.
So, it is earnestly hoped that the authorities will take necessary steps to highlight the matter which is grossly neglected in our context.
Temporary staff of mobile operators losing jobs
June 30, 2008
Hundreds of temporary employees of the country’s telecoms operators lost their jobs in the last few months as major cellphone companies resort to cost cutting measures amid intense competition that leads to call tariff drops.
The people who have lost jobs were mostly working in sales and services departments on contractual basis.
Mobile company insiders estimate 50 percent of around 20,000 people directly employed in Bangladesh’s six mobile phone companies is recruited on contractual or part-time basis.
The massive job cuts started in mid 2007 when maximum mobile operators were fined by the telecoms regulator for their involvement in illegal international call termination business. Four companies –Grameenphone, Banglalink, AKTEL and Citycell– paid Tk 585 crore in fines.
Industry insiders said although the mobile phone industry witnessed a massive subscriber acquisition growth during the last one year from 26.66 million in May 2007 to 42.04 million in May 2008, maximum operators are yet to achieve break-even points, resulting in job cuts.
But they said in the case of profit making Grameenphone the reason could be the strategy to get more profits with a minimum number of employees.
After taking charge last year Grameenphone CEO Anders Jensen announced his cost cutting policy to retain the company’s profitability.
Grameenphone’s operating profit dropped by 32 percent in the first quarter of 2008 compared to the same period of the last year on increasing costs behind a huge number of customer acquisition.
“I have been serving Grameenphone for the last two and a half years as a contractual employee. When I was recruited the authorities told me that I would be a permanent employee after one year. But it did not happen and I continued working,” said a former temporary employee of Grameenphone, who has lost his job recently.
He also said there are other temporary employees in the company who are facing job cuts.
According to sources, some 500 temporary employees lost jobs in Grameenphone in the last one year.
Operators said they have to follow contractual human resources policy for running their sales and service departments.
“Since we are changing our business strategy, we have to cut some jobs at this moment. But it does not mean that the retrenched employees have no future opportunities,” said a high official of Grameenphone.”
“We must value them and gradually give them opportunities when we go for new business projects,” he added.
Maximum mobile phone operators are going for contractual policy, said a Banglalink official, adding, “If you look at the advertisements of companies, you can find maximum jobs are offered on contractual basis.”
Rural and Urban gap in education widens
June 30, 2008
As many as 2,272 schools made 100 percent success and 52,500 students secured GPA-5 (grade point average) in this year’s SSC examinations, while the number of schools with zero pass is 91.
Most of these successful schools and students are from urban areas, while most of the poor performed institutions are in rural areas, according to sources in Inter-Board Computer Section.
Private tuition and quality education make a huge difference in this case. Most of the urban students receive private tuition in addition to better classroom activities.
On the other hand, schools in rural areas don’t have sufficient teachers and most guardians can’t afford private tutors for their children.
Educationists say capitalism has engulfed the country’s education system where students backed by solvent families achieve glorious results, while rural students from poor families struggle to obtain even pass marks as their schools cannot provide quality education.
“This year’s results make it clear that education has now become accessible mainly to the rich and those living in the urban areas. The government’s willingness is the only way to come out of this cycle,” said renowned academician Prof Muhammad Zafar Iqbal.
He added the educationists are frustrated because the government has curtailed the budgetary allocation for education this year.
The educationists put the blame of poor results in the rural areas on the previous government. They say the BNP-Jamaat alliance government politically enlisted many new schools and madrasas under MPO (monthly payment order) even though many of those schools had no teachers for math and English.
This year around three lakh students did not pass and most of them are from rural areas. No less than 80 percent unsuccessful rural students failed in English or math or in both, sources in the computer section say.
Educationists say most schools in rural areas don’t have sufficient teachers, especially for English and math, and the students have to suffer in the end.
Educationist Prof Maniruzzaman Miah, former vice-chancellor of Dhaka University, said there is wide disparity between rural and urban areas in terms of availability of good teachers and infrastructure facilities.
“Particularly in rural areas the number of skilled English and math teachers is inadequate. So these schools make poor results,” he said. Communicative English was introduced a few years ago, but English teachers, particularly in rural areas, are not trained to teach the students, he added.
Education Adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman said stern action will be taken against those institutions with zero pass. The MPO of these schools will be temporary cancelled, sources in the education ministry say.
The schools in urban areas, especially in the metropolises, display a completely different picture.
Among the top ten GPA-5 securing schools, ten are in the capital, eight in Rangpur, Bogra, and Pabna under Rajshahi Board, six in Comilla, Feni and Noakhali under Comilla, nine in Khulna, Kushtia, Jessore and Satkhira under Jessore, six in Chittagong Sadar and Double Mooring under Chittagong, ten in Barisal, Patuakhali, Bhola, Jhalakathi and Pirojpur under Barisal, and nine in Sylhet, Habiganj, Sunamganj and Sreemangal under Sylhet Board.
In the capital, the pass rate is 88.12 percent against the overall pass rate of 72.18 percent. Besides, one-fifth or 10,857 GPA-5 achievers are from Dhaka metropolis, Dhaka Board sources say.
Educationist Prof Serajul Islam Choudhury said disparity in the quality of teaching in rural and urban areas has become an alarming issue.
“A germ has already entered our society. Education has turned into a commodity where investment gets priority. For this reason, students of urban areas perform better in the SSC exams,” he said.
Prof Quazi Faruque, chief coordinator of National Front of Teachers and Employees (NFTE), a platform of eleven non-government teachers’ organisation, said good teachers, especially of English and math, have a trend to move to urban areas as they can earn more through private tuition there.
Education Watch Report-2006, a survey conducted by Campaign for Popular Education (CAMPE), also points finger at the trend towards depending on private tuition.
According to the report, 88 percent students of government high schools and 78 percent students of non-government high schools in urban areas receive private coaching or tuition. Parents spend Tk 16,894 annually on average to provide this private education.
Guardians and students of different schools allege many teachers of English and science subjects often don’t take classes regularly and encourage students to go for private tuition.
Budget implementation hinges on political stability, says FBCCI
June 14, 2008
Annisul Huq, president of Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI), said the government may announce a budget of billions of taka, but in the presence of political impasse this has no usage.
Proposing popular budgetary measures in the context of an unstable political scenario would fail to attract local and foreign investment, said Huq while speaking at a press conference in Dhaka.
Finance and Planning Adviser Mirza Azizul Islam proposed a budget of Tk 99,962 crore with a deficit of Tk 30,000 crore for 2008-09 fiscal on Monday.
“I hope the proposed budget will be implemented by the next elected government as the political impasse is likely to be over soon paving the way to a credible general election,” Huq said.
However, there is a risk of liquidity crisis and higher interest rates on bank loans as the government starts to borrow from banks to fill in the budgetary deficits, he said, adding that the government proposes to borrow Tk13,000 crore from the banking sector to meet the deficit, he said.
“Through its borrowing from the banking sector, government will cause cash constrain in the banking system, resulting in higher interest rates on bank loans. As a result, investment will be hampered and the rate of unemployment will rise,” Huq said.
The FBCCI chief urged the government to provide the untaxed money holders an opportunity to invest their untaxed money in mainstream economic activities by way of setting up new factories.
He said at present the total amount of untaxed money in the country amounts to 30 percent of GDP.
However, the proposed budget is business and industry friendly as the government has proposed to reduce duty on import of both capital machinery and industrial raw materials.
The finance adviser on his budget speech proposed to reduce duty on the import of capital machinery and spare parts from 5 percent to 3 percent and reduction of duty on basic raw materials from 10 percent to 7 percent.
He also proposed to reduce duty on intermediate raw materials from 15 percent to 12 percent, but the duty on finished products is to remain at its highest slab of 25 percent.
Huq urged the government to withdraw 1 percent indemnity duty on import of capital machinery and spare parts.
Finance Adviser proposed for a 1 percent indemnity duty on import of machinery and spare parts for textile industries.
At a meeting with Annisul Huq yesterday, Finance Adviser assured him of possible changes of the proposed budget.
DCCI, DSE seek tax exemption from industrial investment
June 14, 2008
“If conditions on investment of undisclosed money is relaxed, a big amount of undisclosed money will be invested in the industrial sector, which will ultimately enhance the velocity of money circulation, augmenting the economic activities of the country,” said Hossain Khaled, president of DCCI, told a press briefing to express his organisation’s reaction to the new proposed budget in Dhaka yesterday.
The DCCI leaders were also of the view that in the FY 2008-09 the earning from undisclosed money will be dropped, as the time limit for whitening money is only four months.
They also urged the government to make the lowest earning ceiling of income tax at Tk 2.5 lakh from the proposed Tk 1.5 lakh since the cost of living has increased significantly on inflation and price spiral of essentials.
UNB adds: Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) operators yesterday urged the government to exempt the holders of undisclosed money earned by legal means from additional penalty if the money is invested in industrial sector.
“The government could exempt such money from additional charges for the betterment of the country’s economy,” DSE Chief Executive Officer Dr Salahuddin Ahmed Khan said at a post- budget press briefing at the DSE auditorium.