Prime minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday said that her government aims to protect the country, its people and nature from natural calamities, urging all to plant saplings in empty places of houses and offices to protect the environment.
鈥極ur target is to secure the country, its people and nature from natural calamities,鈥� she said.
The prime minister made the remarks while inaugurating the 鈥楴ational Tree Plantation Campaign, Tree Fair 2024鈥� and the 鈥楨nvironment Fair 2024鈥� at the Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka marking World Environment Day.
She also conferred Bangabandhu Award for Wildlife Conservation 2023 and 2024, the National Environment Award-2023 and Prime Minister鈥檚 National Award for Plantation-2022 and 2023 on the winners.
Cheques were also distributed among the beneficiaries of social afforestation programme.
The prime minister said, 鈥榃e have to protect nature as it gives us everything. If we want to live healthy life, we need a beautiful environment and everyone should focus on it.鈥�
To protect nature and environment, she called upon all to plant saplings in empty places wherever they have either it is in the houses or on the roofs and offices.
鈥業 request you all to plant saplings wherever you have bare places. You can have fruit if you plant fruit-bearing trees, you can get enough money by selling wood if you plant wood trees while medicines are also produced from the herbal trees,鈥� she added.
Everyone should plant trees on the premises of offices, schools, colleges, mosques and madrassahs and even on the rooftops along with houses.
鈥榊ou can get shade from the trees which give you comfort. There is also self-satisfaction of eating fruits and vegetables from the own gardens,鈥� she remarked.
Environment, forest and climate change minister Saber Hossain Chowdhury, president of the ministry鈥檚 parliamentary standing committee Dipankar Talukder and secretary Farhina Ahmed, among others, spoke at the programme.
A video documentary on the overall activities of the environment, forest and climate change ministry was screened on the occasion.
Sheikh Hasina briefly described her government鈥檚 various measures like planting trees in large numbers, building cyclone centres and cyclone-tolerant houses in the coastal areas, and formulating several laws, policies and rules to protect the country and its people from the adverse impact of climate change.
鈥榃e are working to protect the country and its people from the natural disasters alongside ensuring food security by growing more food,鈥� she said.
The prime minister said that they had a target of planting 8.38 crore saplings during the monsoon season aimed at increasing the country鈥檚 afforestation.
Sheikh Hasina, also president of the Awami League, said that her party had set a target to plant one crore saplings across the country marking the birth centenary of Bangladesh鈥檚 founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
She said that the target had already surpassed and her party activists had been planting saplings from the first day of the Bangla month of Ashar since 1985.
The prime minister said that the Sunderbans protect the people and their assets from devastating storm, floods and tidal surges.
鈥楽o, we have to ensure more protection for the Sunderbans,鈥� she added.
The head of the government described Bangladesh as one of the pioneers in the world regarding coastal afforestation.
鈥楽ome 261,570 hectares of land in the coastal areas have so far been brought under afforestation,鈥� she said, adding that a green belt was created on 89,853 hectares of land since 2009.
The prime minister said that her government formed 28 self-management committees in 22 places to protect biodiversity.
She said that her government organised Wildlife Olympiad this year to encourage the youth to come forward to save biodiversity.
The prime minister said that they were encouraging the social afforestation among the beneficiaries of the programme.
She said that the beneficiaries of the social afforestation programme were now getting Tk 9 lakh, 8 lakh and 7 lakh as interest for looking after the trees as her government had increased the allowance to 70 per cent from 30 per cent.
鈥楾here is no scope to misappropriate their money which they did not get accordingly earlier,鈥� she added.
She also said that they formed a climate trust fund with own finances and formulated Mujib Climate Prosperity Plan 2022-2041 alongside the adaptation and mitigation plan to survive from natural disasters.
The prime minister said that her government was also working to ensure food security.
Keeping in mind the natural calamities, she said that her government was pursuing research to develop water-tolerant varieties of rice.
The prime minister said that drought-tolerant varieties of rice developed, adding that more research was going on for its further improvement.
鈥榃e need more research on water and drought-tolerant rice varieties for their commercial use,鈥� she said.
She asked all concerned not to excessive use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides in agriculture, suggesting producing agri products in natural ways.
