The New Nation - Internet Edition

For modern marketing network

DEVELOPMENT of a modern agricultural marketing system is very much required to check commodity market volatility. The absence of a modern agricultural marketing mechanism and demand-based production and distribution system ultimately result in unstable commodity prices, huge post-harvest losses and widening gap between farmer and consumer prices. The participants at a recent seminar in the capital said that commodity prices are crucial for both producers and consumers, especially for the poor, as sharp increases in prices significantly lower their real incomes and force them to spend a large proportion of the incomes on food. Instability in producer level prices increases farmers' uncertainty and also discourages private investment in agriculture.

Year to year fluctuations in nominal prices of rice in the country were very high ranging from 0.49 per cent to 21.99 per cent during the period between 2001 and 2007 while it was around 66 per cent in 2008. Though Bangladesh produces about 93 per cent of domestic food requirements, local market prices are virtually controlled by global prices.

Food price increases, in such circumstances, reduce the purchasing power of poor households and compel them to cut on expenditures on other items like eggs, vegetables, meat and milk, which would result in lower intakes of calorie and nutrition.

The Agricultural Produce Markets Regulation Act of 1964 amended in 1985, clarifies only agricultural marketing management but does not have any provisions for organised sale of goods, protection of growers' interests, maintenance of quality standards, safe storage and packaging and transportation. One economist remarked that the politics with food had been intensified all over the world including Bangladesh. The government would have to redefine its role and initiate institutional and policy reforms to strike a balance between demand and supply.

Disaster management needs attention

THE disaster management programme for the coastal districts of the country is reported to be in a pitiable condition for some trifling reasons. Lack of cooperation between the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BRCS) and the cyclone preparedness programme (CPP), unavailability of necessary equipment and long vacancy in an important position are said to be the obstructions to proper running of the CPP. Because of frequent floods and cyclones, disaster management has become a national priority. Anything that stands in the way of the functioning of the CPP needs to be removed forthwith. As immediate measures, procurement of the needed equipment and filling up the post of director administration of CPP should be considered on priority basis.

As per newspaper report, BRCS wants full control over the CPP and is not in favour of its separate existence. BRCS has a long experience in disaster management and the organisation is backed by the International Committee of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies (ICRCS). Since 1973 the administration and management of BRCS has been left with the government, which in course of time has gone under the control of the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief. The 42,000 volunteers of CPP who offer their services for disaster management are BRCS men. Major funding for the job is also collected and supplied by BRCS. But as the entire set-up has been placed under the relevant ministry, BRCS should continue to supervise CPP. In the ultimate analysis, the onus of keeping CPP functional lies on the ministry. So, the ministry should take steps to remove the problems that CPP is facing with a view to strengthening the greater disaster management task.

Harnessing the media to enhance South Asian cooperation

Amanullah Khan

The theme of the forum aptly underlines the crucial role of the media in promoting South Asian Cooperation which holds the key to the socio economic development of the region, home to over a quarter of the world population occupying a relatively small land mass. The nations forming South Asia have a common historical root, a shared vision and more or less identical cultural heritages and fought shoulder to shoulder a common enemy, the colonial masters who presided over their destiny before they won independence. It is an irony that despite all the similarities and bonds, these countries should remain deeply divided and suspicious of each other's motives and intentions, while they are locked in a struggle to attain economic prosperity for their massive populations. South Asian nations have since long been able to free themselves from the yoke of the British Raj through the credo of non-violence and passive resistance. They now face a new kind of common enemy in the form of poverty, hunger, disease, conflicts and other ills that continue to threaten their stability and security. The media represent the most effective and potent weapon with which to fight poverty and all other scourges blighting South Asia today.

Unfortunately notwithstanding all the efforts made so far, progress in terms of South Asian Cooperation has rather been slow and there has not been much of a difference to the lives of the ordinary citizens of South Asia. The full potential of the media to spread the message of peace and harmony, deal with the common set of problems and advance the cause of regional cooperation remains to be tapped.

It is also not unusual for the media to be accused of playing a negative role in South Asian relations driving a wedge between the neighbours in the region instead of striving to smoothen the rough edges in their dealings. AMIC with all the resources at its disposal and a network of leading South Asia media players joining hands with it can act as an anchor in creating an environment and evolving a code of conduct for the media to enable them to live up to the people's expectations as an unifying and cementing force by disseminating information that are in the best interests of the region as a whole. South Asia is so inextricably intertwined and inter-dependent that it can hardly emerge as an economic power and a major political actor on the world stage without the existence of close ties within the region. This is the crucial message that needs to be driven home by the media.

It is indeed an encouraging sign that AMIC has set out as one of its principal objectives to foster South Asian cooperation by harnessing the media. It is to this end that AMIC has launched the first SAMF an annual event, from Bangladesh, the birth place of SAARC as an important regional bloc, that will act as a clearing house of ideas for media academics and practitioners interacting with each other and build a strong platform from which to set rolling the media initiatives and actions designed to ensure the overall development of South Asian nations in order to fulfill the aspirations and hopes for a better life of about 1500 million people inhabiting the region.

The annual forum will seek to establish a dialogue between the media institutions and professionals from across South Asia with a view to identifying the ways in which the media in the region can become a real force in deepening the South Asian regional cooperation. In addition, the forum will also strive to identify mechanisms and processes that will help develop the media in the region through greater media exchanges, capacity building and experience and knowledge sharing. AMIC and its partners believe that South Asia media is capable of playing a pivotal role in setting in motion the confidence building measures among the nations in South Asia to dispel the deep-seated mutual suspicion and mistrust, the first step toward forging any sustained relations among them.

Once the seemingly impregnable wall of hatred and misgivings that separate the nations in South Asia crumbles down under the weight of change of attitudes and mindset brought about by the media connectivity that has paradoxically been something of a disconnect, a bridge of goodwill and trustworthiness can be built and the entire gamut of relations and linkages will fall into place and be set on course.

Media's principal task is to connect and bring people closer together in unison and not to set them apart or set one against the other. Nowhere is this more true, relevant and meaningful than in the case of relationships that subsist among South Asian nations.

(The article is based on the address given by the author at a seminar in Dhaka to launch AMIC's First South Asia Media Forum on 2 May 2008. The author is the Chairman of UNB and AMIC Representative in Bangladesh)

Problems faced by the Off-floor Traders of DSE

Syed Amirul Haque

The number of retail investors at Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) is increasing day by day. Investors from different background and levels inside and outside Bangladesh are gradually engaging their valuable wealth in our capital market. At present DSE is trying to expand its activity outside Dhaka rapidly and as a result investors from different districts are also increasing. Definitely this is a positive sign for our capital market as well as the financial sector/economy of our country.

Beside big institutions, retail investors of our country are a very important part of our capital market which must be realized by the authority of our capital market. As a result of increasing investor number presently DSE is providing live/online trading data (3 minute delayed) through its official website www.dsebd.org. Now-a-days it has been seen that during trading hours number of investors/traders who trade from in front of trading workstations at different broker house premises is only a small fraction of the total number of off-floor investors/traders who trade daily over phone from inside and outside Dhaka. Most of these off-floor or outside-broker house traders have to solely depend on the live trading data of DSE website (www.dsebd.org) as frequent query about different stock prices throughout trading hour over telephone to broker houses is very costly, time consuming and full of hassle.

Problems faced by the users of DSE website:

1. SE website is hosted on the server of BOL (Bangladesh Online Limited) with little upload bandwidth allocation compared to actually needed. So during trading hours while many investors browse the site from homes/offices throughout the country due to bandwidth saturation most users cannot browse the site at all throughout the trading hours. But after trading hour it is accessible due to lower traffic. Only BOL clients get an edge in browsing the site during trading hours although most of the DSE website users throughout the country are clients of other ISPs/Mobile Operators.

2. t has been seen that many off-floor investors/traders lost their money in the market as they could not be informed about falling price of their stocks timely as they could not browse DSE website during trading hours (due to its bandwidth limitation) on which they were solely dependent.

3. s during trading hour there is much crowd remain present in front of trading workstations at broker house premises it is time consuming to get latest share price information frequently over telephone from broker house operators. This delay in getting share price information throughout trading hours greatly reduces efficiency of off-floor/outside traders in taking instant investment decisions.

4. xpansion of our capital market and expansion of investment is a demand of the time. DSE, SEC and BD Govt. are trying their best to enhance the activity of our capital market. Unavailability of online DSE trading data or low bandwidth of DSE website is creating and will also continue creating very bad impact in this mission.

Huge numbers of investors who solely depend on live/online trading data of DSE website are very frustrated and have reached at the last stage of their tolerance.

According to the severe problems faced by most off-floor traders of DSE throughout the country in accessing live/online trading data through their website mentioned above it is high time for DSE authority to implement an own web service system for live/online trading data with sufficient bandwidth so that off-floor traders can easily and instantly access latest stock price without any hassle. Now-a-days total daily trading occurring at DSE is several hundred crore taka and as a result DSE is collecting huge amount of commission from broker houses daily. So undoubtedly we can say DSE is rich enough to implement necessary bandwidth based web service for providing online trading data. Unfortunately still today they did not take initiative to organize their own web hosting system for online trading data which off-floor traders demanding since many months. Lack of a proper and speedy trading data service for a modern stock exchange like DSE which possesses highly qualified technical hands in their ICT/Web division has now become a prestige issue for them.

Immediately DSE authority should take appropriate bandwidth from a suitable service provider to construct their own hassle free web based live trading data service at this crucial stage so that every Bangladeshi off-floor trader/ investor inside and outside the country can easily access necessary data for their valuable investment.

Exploring the marine resources

Md Tareq Mahmud

Bangladesh is a country with a small territory of 14 million hectares (mn ha), where the cultivable land area is only 9 mn ha. But it is blessed by 3 mn ha of coastal area, of which 1 mn ha is specially characterized by rich and diverse fauna and flora. The coastal area starts from the Indian border in the west and extends some 480 km up to the Burma (Myanmar) border in the southeast and the Bay of Bengal in the south. It includes the numerous low-lying islands and vast mangrove swamps (the Sundarbans) in the southern part of the Ganges-Brahmaputra delta, the similar but much smaller estuarine systems along the Chittagong coast (Chokoria Sundarbans and Naaf Estuary), and a single coral island of the extreme southern tip of the country (St. Martin's Island).The estuaries are also very rich in prawns and shrimps, such as Parapenaeosis, Penaeus, Palaeomon, etc., including estuarine crocodiles, 25 species of turtles and tortoises, three species of monitor lizards and numerous snakes. In fact, the coastal resources are rich with a wide diversity of plants and animals, including significant wild life species. The western part of the Sundarbans lies in India and the rest, almost 60 per cent, is in Bangladesh. This is dominated by two plant species, Heriteria fomes and Excoecaria agallocha. It is characterized by tidal inundation with the pattern of semidiurnal type and the maximum amplitude of 3 m at spring tides. The climate is humid tropical, with an annual rainfall of about 1600 mm to 2500 mm in the central and outer coasts, respectively. Violent storms are frequent during the pre-monsoon period, and again in September, October and November.

Fishermen commonly catch over 120 species of fishes, including 95 species of water fowl, more than 270 species of local and migratory birds, along with very rich species of birds of prey in mangrove swamps. About 42 species of mammals are still seen in the Sundarbans, including the rare Royal Bengal Tiger, Panthera tigris. A recent study estimates the principal mammalian populations as: 350 tigers; 40,000- 70,000 rhesus macaques; 50,000- 80,000 spotted deer; 20,000 wild boars; and 20,000 smooth-coated otters. Crustaceans are also important for the biomes of the system. Crabs, prawns and shrimps are the main groups.

About 20 million people live in the coastal region of Bangladesh, 20 per cent of whom directly depend on the coastal and marine resources for their livelihood. They live exclusively on fishing of wild fish, along with crabs, prawns and shrimps. In addition, the mangrove ecosystem provides living support to nearly 300,000 coastal people through fishing, collecting honey, wax and timber, hunting, and soon. Fishery production in mangroves increased significantly to 14,000 tonnes in 1982-83, compared to 640 tonnes in 1972-73. Many thousands are engaged in collection of honey and wax. It was estimated that about 232 tonnes of honey and wax were harvested in1983. In addition, collection of shrimp fry is an important source of livelihood. The mangrove forest also has a buffer function, protecting the densely settled agricultural areas to the north from the full force of cyclonic storms and tidal waves.

The marine resource of Bangladesh is also of great importance, geographically provided by a relatively shallow embayment of the northeastern Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal in the southern part. The Bay of Bengal occupies an area of

2,173,000 sq km, with an average depth of 2,600 meters and a width of 1600 km. In 1974, the special economic zone provision allowed Bangladesh the right of enjoying up to 200 nautical miles (370 km) from the seashore, which comprises an area of 166,000 sq. km, larger than the land mass.

The ecosystem in this region is quite distinct and tropical in nature. The huge river drainage and the profusion of wetlands, marshes, and mangroves increase productivity of near-shore fish species. About 475 species of fishes are found in this renewable habitat, along with 16 species of marine shrimps. In addition, several species of crabs and 31 species of turtles and tortoises, of which 24 live in coastal fresh-water environment, are also found (P. Gain, 1998). The marine fishery is totally open and contributes to 23 per cent of the total fish catch. The marine fisheries are of two types: industrial (trawling) and artisanal, the former contributing about 6 per cent and the later 17 per cent of the total catch. Another aspect is the discovery of petroleum and gas reserves in the marine zone. It was recently estimated that about 20 trillion cubic feet of gases can be extracted from the bottom of the Bay of Bengal. The most recent World Bank estimate shows that Bangladesh is expected to receive US$ 1049 million by 2004, most of which would go to the oil and gas sectors. Regarding ocean transportation facilities, the

Bay of Bengal is of great significance to Bangladesh and neighboring countries like Sri Lanka, India and Myanmar. Carriage of cargoes to and from these countries is of immense importance. The oceanic transport route directly supports the principal seaports of Bangladesh, Chittagong and Mongla.

Degradation of the Marine Environment: Industrial effluents and urban sewage, along with agrochemicals used in the coastal crop fields, are the main threats to the coastal-marine water resource. The two seaports, Chittagong and Mongla, along with the industrial cities of Khulna and Chittagong are of highest concern. In Chittagong, out of the 720 industrial units, only 20 per cent treat their liquid effluents before disposal. These effluents contain hazardous chemicals like chromium, salt, sulphur, costic soda, butanol and so on, finally carried to the Bay of Bengal through the river Karnafuli.

Khulna possesses 300 large industrial units, which discharge about 10 million gallons of liquid waste that finally reach the Bay of Bengal through the Sundarbans. Oil spills on the seaports and ships navigating the area are other sources of pollution. Shipbreaking on the beach add to the pollution. All these pollutants seriously affect the aquatic fauna and the mangrove vegetations. Uncontrolled, illegal fishing and overfishing of marine fishes and aquatic turtles, molluscs and crustaceans threaten marine fish resources. Excess navigation also disturbs the natural habitat of the aquatic flora and fauna.

The Sundarbans have been exploited from time immemorial, when human settlement started in the basin by cutting and clearing the vegetation for homestead and cultivation. Hardly 100 years ago, the area came under the maintenance of the government's department of forest. Agricultural encroachment, a common and indigenous phenomenon to this important ecosystem, threatens its existence. Population explosion and dense settlement in the coast surrounding the Sundarbans could reach a disastrous position, unless checked. Fishermen's camps are also a cause of serious disturbance, with their illegal trapping and hunting. This illegal activity is also done by the woodcutters and a reasonable number of civil and defence officers. Along with agricultural encroachment, the recent aquaculture missions, especially shrimp farms and their intensive cultivation, have added serious damage to the mangrove forests, including the fries of all wild fish.

The ecological disturbances of mangrove forests have been caused by many anthropogenic activities that go against the natural course of development. The first one is the diversion of Ganges water streams. About 40 per cent of the dry season flow of the Ganges has been diverted upstream, following the Farrakhan Barrage in India in 1974. This accelerates the decrease of fresh-water flushing and increases the saline water intrusion, particularly in the dry season, which damages the vegetation and finally degrades the environment. Oil spills cause immense damage, especially to the aquatic fauna and sea birds. The seaport Mongla is the main source of oil spills, with pollution also coming from the large and numerous shipping vessels that pass through the Sundarbans every day via the northeast shipping route. The most significant and immediate threat is the illegal overextraction of the timber and fauna. In the 1980s, an assessment showed that the stock of Heriteria fomes, the principal variety of mangrove locally known as Sundari, has declined by 40 per cent since the forest inventory of 1959. At the same time, another dominant species, Excoecaria agallocha, has fallen by 45 per cent. For any Bangladeshi, it would be shocking to know that, in the near future, the Sunderbans will be a misnomer due to the possible extinction of Sundari if the trend of exploitation continues, instead of conservation and management.