Bangladesh’s history, culture and religion is symbolised by water. The Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna basin and 230 inland rivers act as lifelines for food, transport and livelihood for the majority of the population in Bangladesh.
In 2014 Bangladesh experienced the highest temperature in 54 years, which has led to an acute water shortage in rivers and low lying areas. It is not only the dry season affects the country; heavy rainfall within short periods also causes severe floods and river banks to erode and overflow. Due to the extremely flat topography, the country often has too much water flowing in its 57 transboundary rivers connected to the upper riparian country. These heavy changes - flooding in monsoon and drought in dry season – are causing a socio-economic disaster for Banglade...
Oil and gas giant Chevron is trying to take its experiences in the private sector and apply them to international development. It has implemented programs in Angola, Nigeria, Kazakhstan and now Bangladesh. The company committed $10 million to its five-year Bangladesh Partnership Initiative (BPI), in September. Its aim is to “promote economic stability, job creation and accelerate sustainable growth in local communities where Chevron operates.”
A year prior Chevron finalized a deal to provide roughly $130 m...
Two months ago Rashida Khatun, 13, was invited to a wedding. The daughter of a farm laborer, she didn’t know until she got there that the wedding she’d been invited to would be her own.
Like 29.1 percent of female Bangladeshis, Khatun was married before the age of 15. Now the country with among the world’s highest rates of child marriage (depending on how it’s defined) is addressing the issue in a way that has raised eyebrows among human rights advocates: A government body in Bangladesh has proposed lowering the legal age at which people can marry, from 18 to 16 for girls and from 21 to 18 for boys.
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The prize giving ceremony of “IFIC Bank-DQS SSMC Carnival Captive 2014” was held at Bangladesh Medical Association (BMA) auditorium in the city on Friday. Debate and Quiz Society (DQS) of Sir Salimullah Medical College organized the event.
Liberation War Affairs Minister AKM Mozammel Haque was the chief guest at the ceremony while language activist and Rabindra researcher, Dr Ahmed Rafiq was present as the distinguished special guest. Managing Director of IFIC Bank, Shah A Sarwar, Assistant General Secretary of Bangladesh Med...
Nobel Peace Prize winner and microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus is a champion of big ideas and small loans. Muhammad Yunus, the founding father of “microcredit” and the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize Winner, is in New York City this week to take part in the annual Clinton Global Initiative meetings.
Yunus, a Bangladeshi and founder of the Grameen Bank, which makes loans to people too poor to offer collateral in return, is serving as one the judges for the Hult Prize, in which six teams of college and university students — the survivors of a rigorous worldwide winnowing — will present their ideas for sustainable businesses designed to help the poor.
Eighteen months ago the Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh collapsed, killing more than 1,100 garment workers, and prompting global shock and outrage.
Companies responded by promising to improve their act: more than 150 international retailers signed up to the Bangladesh accord on fire and building safety, a legally binding agreement designed to make factories safer for workers.
As a result of the accord, garment factories in Bangladesh are now being properly inspected for the first time, bringing key safety issues to light.
Although not everything is resolved – victims and families of people killed in the disaster are still waiting for full compensation – the accord does at least show that companies can be made to acknowledge and act upon their supply-chain responsibility.
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