AIR quality has been steadily declining for a decade, with corrective measures being in disarray. An Energy Policy Institute study of the University of Chicago In 2023 found Bangladesh鈥檚 air to be the most polluted globally, gravely impacting citizens鈥� health and reducing life expectancy by at least 6.8 years. The Centre for Atmospheric Pollution Studies found the average Air Quality Index score for Dhaka at 171 in 2024, which was 150 in 2016. The World Health Organisation considers the AQI value for particle pollution between 151 and 200 as 鈥榰nhealthy.鈥� In 2024, unhealthy air was recorded for a 216 days in Dhaka, which was 92 days in 2016. In 2019, as the World Bank says, air pollution was the second largest risk factor causing death and disability in Bangladesh and economic losses from air pollution were estimated between 3.9 and 4.4 per cent of the country鈥檚 gross domestic product. Factors contributing to air pollution are known and public health burden of the pollution is also documented, but the government steps have remained episodic and ineffective.
The Centre for Atmospheric Pollution Studies reported that 28 per cent polluted air was generated from biomass burning, 24 per cent from power plants, 12 per cent from brick kilns, 11 per cent from the open burning of wastes, 8 per cent from dust and 13 per cent from other sources. The centre鈥檚 director says that air quality declined because new sources of pollution were added in the absence of a strict oversight. In the recent past, a number of High Court directives asked the government to prepare time-bound preventive strategies and an action plan to reverse the situation. But successive governments so far have been focused on episodic drives against brick kilns and industrial establishments. In 2024, the environment department conducted 220 mobile court drives against air polluters, filed 567 cases, realised Tk 8 crore in fines and took punitive actions against 150 brick kilns. Declining air quality makes it evident that episodic action is ineffective. Long-term and systemic intervention is, rather, needed. The environment, forest and climate change adviser also talks about the importance of a long-term strategy to contain air pollution and that environmental protection is the government鈥檚 priority policy concern. Yet, the government鈥檚 action in containing air pollution remains rhetorical.
Cardiovascular diseases, cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases have direct and indirect links with air pollution. More important, the inaction and failure on part of the government is a violation of constitutional provisions, which say that the government should protect, conserve and maintain the environment. The government should, therefore, prepare a long-term strategy and a short-term, time-bound mitigation plan to effectively shut down environmentally hazardous brick kilns, ban black smoke-emitting vehicles, and reduce dust from construction work. The health ministry, in collaboration with the environment ministry, should develop a system to record the burden of diseases caused by air pollution for a systematic oversight on public health effects.
