The prime minister, the government and the people of Bangladesh can be justly proud that the country will now be able to graduate out of the Least Developed Country (LDC) status within the next few years. However, this graduation comes with both risks as well as opportunities. The first risk is that we will lose our duty-free access to the …

Many oil-rich countries like Norway, United Arab Emirates and Brunei have put billions of US dollars into Sovereign Wealth Funds through which they invest in interest-bearing assets around the world, either enhancing the amount in the fund, or for subsidising costs of selected services for their own citizens. Bangladesh has the potential to develop its own sovereign wealth assets over …

Bangladesh and India should build solar farms, not coal plants, on both sides of the border By- Saleemul Huq and Daniel M Kammen Last week, Bangladesh’s Power Development Board (PDB) and India’s National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) announced that they will form a committee to decide whether to build a large coal plant or solar farm in India for additional …

Having just returned from a scoping mission to Cox’s Bazar to see the environmental situation both inside and outside the Rohingya camps, I am going to share some thoughts on the immediate and long-term needs from an environmental perspective. Before doing so, I would like to pay tribute to the people and government of Bangladesh as well as the international …

At the recently concluded two-day international conference on climate finance in Dhaka, about a hundred national and 50 international experts, government officials, researchers and private sector representatives shared their experiences and knowledge about raising and spending money to tackle climate change around the world. The conference was organised by the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS) with the International Centre …

Bangladesh has taken some important steps for long-term planning at the national level in order to achieve development goals Bangladesh has a long tradition of preparing national development plans by the General Economics Division (GED) of the Planning Commission primarily through the adoption of five-year plans of which we are currently in the 7th Five Year Plan (7FYP) which runs …

Bangladesh plans to graduate out of the Least Developed Country (LDC) status soon. One of major element that is part and parcel of this graduation will be the generation and use of evidence and knowledge. A good indicator of a least developed country, besides low per capita income, is how much of the research and knowledge generated about the country …

As we move into the new year it is perhaps appropriate to reflect on the significant actions and developments that occurred in 2017 in the arena of climate change, both globally and nationally, and do some crystal-ball-gazing into the future. In my view, there has been a significant number of positive developments and successes that the world has achieved in …

As this month of December is both the end of the calendar year as well as the month when we commemorate the 47th year of Bangladesh’s existence as an independent country, I am going to write this column with a look into the future over where Bangladesh can go over next few decades. These thoughts may sound visionary or perhaps …

Moving from words to action in tackling climate change On December 12, 2015 at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris, France, under the leadership of the then President Hollande, the historic Paris Agreement on climate change was adopted. It was a historic agreement for a number of important …