Category: Bangladesh

Blue Economy of Bangladesh: Opportunity for Sustainable Development

Nowadays one of the most highlighted topics for Bangladesh is blue economy. Blue economy refers to the economic activity based on maritime resources. The blue economy is the sustainable use of ocean resources for economic growth, improve livelihoods, and jobs while preserving the health of ocean ecosystem (WB). Blue Economy was considered at the RIO+20 UNITED NATION conference on sustainable development, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June 2012. The sea is the best sources of energy utilization. Now many nations are trying to ensure the most extreme utilization of the sea. We have a goal of become a developed nation by 2041. It is called ‘VISSION 2041’. And our economy is based on Agriculture. It is not enough for a country for reaching this type of goal. If we want to fulfil our goal, we need to give focus on blue economy. My goal in this paper to bring the topic that how we can use the opportunity of blue economy for sustainable development. For achieving my goal, I want to organize my paper into three sections. First section I want to provide information about our maritime border. In second section I will provide the information why blue economy is important. In third section I will provide the sectors of blue economy what we can use for reaching our goal.

Ocean is a mystery for the people of Bangladesh. The waves, fish, ship, are the ornaments of the sea. We have maritime border with India and Myanmar. But we had no maritime boundary with them. For this reason, we couldn’t use our ocean properly. But recently, Bangladesh has picked up a large area in the Bay of Bengal through the settlement of sea debates with India and Myanmar. Maritime boundary is the division of the water surface of the planet into maritime areas of contribution that are defined through surrounding physical geography or by human geography. It is also called the borders of a maritime nation and is recognized by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS:1983). Bangladesh has achieved absolute sovereignty on vast maritime area, on overall, approximately 111,631 square kilometers was assigned to Bangladesh of the relevant area with Myanmar (approximately 171,832 square kilometers to Myanmar) (Zamal Fayaz, 2012), and 19,467 sq. kms to Bangladesh of 25,602 sq. kms with India (Ajker Bisso). This sea settlement has preferred Bangladesh with the extension of regional territory and Economic zone. The geographical zone involves more than 1,18,813 sq. km. of water including 200 nautical miles over the sizeable range. Now Bangladesh can claim to be a nation of blue economy.

Bangladesh is a small country with vast population. And we also have enough natural resources on land side. Like natural gas, Coal, etc. But we are losing our resources rapidly. We can’t find fish in our river. Rivers are all going to dead. We can’t find gas for home. We are using coal for increasing our supply of electricity. Not only in Bangladesh but also all over the world has been racked by food, oil, natural, economic and money related crisis. But Bangladesh can solve these problems. For solving those problems, we need to use properly our blue economy. A blue economy can bargain systemically with these difficulties. 70% of the world is secured by the sea and around 90% of the world’s exchange of products is directed via ocean. It is high time that Bangladesh set up to utilize the ocean assets and fitted its labor with learning and innovating to bring success to the country.

If we want to see our country as a developed country, we need to use our ocean properly. Our nation has won the massive maritime boundary. It has made a large scope to investigate mineral resources from the seabed without any obstacles. A great supply of living and non-living assets is available under the seabed and water section. We can see some potential sectors of blue economy for Bangladesh.

Tourism

Tourism is one of the most gainful sectors in Bangladesh. And sea-based tourism is very popular for our nation. We can make it our one of the most gainful business sectors. We have incredible chance for become a tourist-based country. We can make it by using our sea side. Furthermore, new one vital thing is the tourism-related administrations spread to similarly to what inaccessible to remote regions already.

Cox’s Bazar: It is the first candidate amongst the tourism destinations of Bangladesh. It was named by British East India company officer, Captain Hiram Cox (Wikipedia). It is considered as the largest sea beach of the world. This beach is unbroken 120 km sandy sea beach. Most popular points or beaches are Laboni beach, Sugondha beach, Inani beach. We can visit popular Himchori hill and see natural fount. And we have the biggest surprise which is Marine Drive. This is the largest marine drive in the world about 80 km. For this reason, at present, Cox’s Bazar is the most visited tourism place of Bangladesh.

Saint Martin: This is the only one coral island in Bangladesh. It has another name also, Narikel Jinjira, Daruchini Dip. Now this place has been a popular attraction of local and foreign tourists in Bangladesh. One can reach St Martin from Teknaf within few hours. The number of visitors is increasing year by year.

Kuakata: Kuakata is located in Kalapara upazila, Potuakhali district. It has an excellent view of sunrise and sunset from the same beach in the water of Bay of Bengal. This beach’s area is about 18 km. This sandy beach has gentle slope into Bay of Bengal. Many migratory birds come in Kuakata for staying. Because of poor transport facilities, this place has very few visitors. The government should take care of this.

Fisheries

Fisheries is a very significant issue for a country like Bangladesh where it has a large number of river and ocean. We are third highest fish production country in the world. Bangladesh with its inland waters and river systems has significant capture fishery and agriculture potential. This fisheries sector plays a very important role in the national economy contributing 3.69% to the GDP of the country and 22.60% to the agriculture GDP (FRSS, 2016). Fisheries can play bigger role in our GDP by using our sea. We have now large area of sea. Now we have an open door for catching fish. This area adds 450 types fish in our list. That is huge. We can earn money by exporting them. The amount takes the export earnings in the first seven months of fiscal 2017-18 to $353.99 million (Daily Star). Now we can increase the number more.

Natural Resources

On land side we have main natural resources are fish and gas. We talk about fish the previous paragraph. And we have a massive side about gas-oil block. On land area we have 23 blocks of gas-oil. And we are using this for our daily work. We are now losing their quantity. But sea brings us a big side about this. Ocean gives us 26 blocks of gas-oil. But we have a little problem. We have now 49 blocks of gas (Petrobangla). But we have no enough perfect people for recovering this gas. So, we can’t use them right now. But now we can get smile on our face. Because govt. gives importance on this sector. If we can get this, this can make new skyline for our country.

Shipping

Shipping is now going to be another successful business sector for Bangladesh. We have now very good rate in ship-building and ship-breaking sector. We can make our own warship from our shipyard. And last year we export ship. We have earned a lot of money. And also, we have done a flourishing movement in ship-breaking sector. We have now 3 shipyards, they are Anandya shipyard, Khulna shipyard, and Chattrogram shipyard. But we have many obstacles in this sector. If we can remove these problems, this sector can be a great business sector for us.

Conclusion

At this moment, Bangladesh needs to create more awareness about blue economy. Because sea or ocean which name is Bay of Bengal is ours. It’s water, fish, oil-gas block everything is ours. Many people’s life is directly related with ocean. If we can make awareness and can utilize this sector properly, this can change the life of Bangladeshi people. The blue economy can be one of the possible solutions for Bangladesh for achieving its goal. From analyses, we can see our sea production is increasing. It is a good sign for our country. But frequent flood is damaging the possibilities blue economy of Bangladesh. Without having well-trained, skilled, educated human resources in different marine industries, sustainable and dynamic blue economy can’t be possible for any country.

Government should take future policy frame work for the success of the blue economy which may focus structural collaboration. Capacity building of maritime forces, namely Bangladesh Navy and Bangladesh Coast Guard, are other prerequisites to ensure safer seas for the seafarers of tomorrow. Many bad persons are walking with us. From them, we need to protect our sea and blue economy.

References

1. Ajker Bisso: Golam Mostofa Kiron. 97 edition.
2. Daily Star. “January Export Earnings Highest in 5 Months”. Published April 5, 2019.
3. Fayaz Zamal, Sachalayatan.com, 28/3/2012. ‘Bangladesh Vs Myanmar Maritime Boundary Dispute, Verdict: A Brief Summary’. FRSS: Fast Response Survey System.
4. Petrobangla: https://www.petrobangla.org.bd/
5. UNCLOS: United Nation Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS): Official Text, United Nations, New York, 1983, p.17.
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cox%27s_Bazar

The Evolution Of White Collar Crime In Bangladesh

White Collar crime generally encompasses a variety of non violent crimes that are usually committed in commercial situations for financial gain. They are generally committed by high ranking professionals, politicians or business people. These people often by virtue of their occupation, exploit social, economic or technological power for personal or financial gain. The scope of white collar crime includes cybercrime, healthcare fraud, intellectual property crimes, embezzlement, bribery, conspiracy, occlusion of justice, perjury, money laundering, antitrust violations, trust crimes and regulatory violations.

In Bangladesh white collar crimes are on the rise. Here politics has criminalized and corruption has taken strong hold. Transparency International (TI), a German based non-governmental organization, has identified Bangladesh as the most corrupt country in the world for consecutive five years. But in 2013 it increased and positioned 14. People of upper socio-economic class, ruling elites and people of different groups are committing white collar crimes in Bangladesh. They are making huge amounts of money by corruption, manipulation and abuse of power causing severe detriment to the national economy.

In Bangladesh, not only the people of upper socioeconomic class are involved in white collar crime, the people from top to bottom are practicing this vice, so far corruption, bribery and other malpractices are concerned. All the categories of white collar crimes are present here, but corruption occupies the most prominent place. In identifying and discussing white collar crime in Bangladesh, all pervasive corruption has taken the foremost priority. Greed and unlimited desires, in the absence of sufficient social control, seem to contribute to these crimes and its voluminous increase. Anomie and social control theorists suggest that when social control is either absent or weakens, it will lead to deregulation in the society, where many problems arise. (Ahmed, 2013)

The focus on my research will be on two subtopics- Since, Bangladesh stands in the 143rd place out of 180 most corrupted countries in the world therefore finding justice for these kinds of crimes is nearly impossible, I would like to know if and how the offenders should be punished. White Collar Crimes destroy enormous amounts of shareholder values in companies. In corporate crimes, perpetrators of crimes who are punished pay a wbprice financially and professionally. But what is less obvious or widely recognized is the damage to employees who had nothing to do with the crime. In Bangladesh, the low rate of legal action against the perpetrators most likely reflects the practical challenges of prosecuting white-collar criminals: Evidence that an individual committed an act doesn’t suffice; there also has to be proof that he or she intended to commit it or had knowledge of wrongdoing. Given the potential penalties and reputational risks to companies, corporate attorneys often advise executives to quietly dismiss perpetrators without any legal action.

The focus of my research will also be the effects it has in our society. Most experts agree that the economic impact of white-collar crime is far more costly than ordinary crime. White-collar crime can endanger employees through unsafe working conditions, injure consumers because of dangerous products, and cause pollution problems for a community. Sociologists have emphasized that white-collar crimes are particularly harmful to society because they are committed by persons in power who are expected to set a moral example and behave responsibly. (Meier & Short, 1982)

White Collar crime, which is a nonviolent crime done for financial gain, originated in 1949 and was recognized by sociologist Edwin Sutherland. He defined it as ‘crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of their occupation. Over the years, white collar crimes surged as advancements in technology and new financial products appeared. For instance, Credit Suisse was found guilty in 2014 by helping US citizens to avoid paying taxes by hiding income from the Internal Revenue Service. The bank then agreed to pay a penalty of $2.6 billion. (Chen, 2020). In 1997 the UK witnessed one of the biggest white collar crimes. The former shipping tycoon Abbas Gokal was imprisoned for 14 years as he was a part of the collapse of Bank of Credit & Commerce International. He had created a web of loans which totalled $1.2 billion (£794 million). The Social Fraud Office also got a hold of Kevin Foster who was imprisoned for 10 years as he developed a pyramid scheme. It was a football betting scheme where he takes stakes from his colleagues, promising them a fivefold return on their money, and encouraging participants to roll over their winnings and invest further in his next scheme.

From there, he expanded his scheme, named it KF Concept in 2002, and launched a series of roadshows in England, Wales and Scotland. He was able to extract a total of £34m from more than 8,500 investors. His main targets were low-income small towners who were very close to each other. Foster was charged in 2007 which led to a trial and conviction in 2010. During his investigation, it was found that £12m of the money raised had been channeled into an illegal pyramid investment scheme, Planline,of which only £1,703 was ever recovered. It was also found that he had used a large amount of this money for living a luxurious life. (Kevin Foster (fraudster), 2020) Sutherland started examining White Collar crimes during the depression in the 1930s.His enthusiasm for this subject came from the search for the general theory of crime. During his time which also happens now, people used to find the reason for these crimes to be due to poverty, unemployment and other pathological factors but he argued that these cannot be used as justification for crimes committed by people of high social and respectable status. The webpage says, “In the book-length version of the speech, [“The White Collar Criminal”] which appeared a decade later, Sutherland aimed simultaneously to weaken theories depending on the behavior of the deprived and the depraved, and to provide support for his own social-learning approach to crime causation—the theory of differential association.” His book focused not on the persons but on the crimes of organizations which were seventy large corporations and fifteen public utilities; like sometimes it focused on persons of high status, sometimes on occupations and other times on corporate bodies. This book stirred up a great controversy as it had – “described the illegalities committed by those corporations, arguing that the corporations share most of the characteristics of professional thieves: their offenses are deliberate and organized, they are often recidivists, and they show disdain for law.” This made some people consider this book as a holy grail while others found it misleading. Most people disagreed with the book because of the concept of the crime. The crimes Sutherland had researched and written about were rarely prosecuted in the court and many legal officials said that these were not even considered crimes. Sutherland answered this by saying that these businessmen had great power over the legal proceedings which helped them to avoid any punishments for their crimes. (White Collar Crime: History of an Idea, n.d.)

Bangladesh is not the out of victim of white collar crime, rather this type of crime led the country into a higher corrupted country in the world from 2001 to 2005 correspondingly. Here the politicians who hold the power are mostly criminalized and corrupted. (White Collar Crime in Bangladesh, pp. 4.3, 2015) Bangladesh has followed other creating nations in an equivalent grasp of professional culpability. The quick improvement in economy and mechanical development in late decades has expanded clerical violations in the current day. Already (during the time of BNP-Jamat govt.) the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) has recognized Bangladesh has been the most corrupt nation for five successive years. Individuals of the upper financial class, administering elites and individuals of various gatherings are perpetrating desk wrongdoings in Bangladesh. They are making a lot of money through debasement, control and the maltreatment of intensity, making extreme inconvenience to the public economy. The professions of humanity such as –Doctor, Engineer, Lawyer, NGO holder, teachers are not out of this. It is common knowledge that certain professions offer lucrative opportunities for criminal acts and unethical persons in business, various professions and even in public life. They will in general become corrupt due to their disregard at school, home and other social organizations where individuals get prepared for citizenship and character building. These deviants have meager respect for genuineness and other moral qualities. In this manner they carry on their criminal operations without risk of punishment without the dread of loss of notoriety or status. (Babu, 2017)

The Current State of the Newspaper Industry in Bangladesh

Bangladesh has currently 3025 newspapers in total. This total number includes 1078 daily newspaper, 1947 weekly newspaper and fortnightlies and monthlies. The newspaper media industry had its best time where the circulation of newspaper and the rate of newspaper reader were increasing until 2013. As the literacy rate increased, the number of newspaper reader increased as well. People would wake up and they would read the newspaper while having a cup of coffee; they would read the newspaper while going to the workplace while riding on a bus or a car. It became a everyday thing in people’s lives. Decrease in newspaper circulation started in 2014 where the circulation drastically dropped by 14% from the previous year. In our country, the top 10 newspapers are the market leaders and they own 95% of the whole market share. According to Journalism School, government provided wrong data regarding the total number of circulation of newspaper. The circulation kept decreasing after 2013. For example, Prothom Alo circulated 5.02 lacs newspaper in 2013 whereas the number of newspaper circulation in 2014 and 2015 were 4.5 lacs and 4.26 lacs. The Daily Ittefaq, the oldest newspaper in Bangladesh, used to circulate 110,000 newspapers in 2009. The number decreased to 90,000 in 2011 and 8,000 in 2015. The decrease in circulation of newspaper happened globally. According to Matiur Rahman, the then chief of the Newspaper Owners’ Association of Bangladesh or NOAB, Bangladeshi newspapers are losing its reader at a 5% to 10% in the past few years which reduced the revenue stream of the newspaper industry.

However, there has been an increase in the circulation number recently. According to the latest data released by Department of Films and Publications or DFP, the number has not decreased in term of copies sold by the newspapers. For example, according to data for January 1 this year, the newspaper’s circulation Prothom Alo was 501,800 which shows the number of circulation increased in the last five years. Bangladesh Pratidin is selling 553,300 copies on each of the two days before and after as many years. This data list was made by the official at information ministry. However, they doubt the number themselves. Where the newspaper industry has been dying the in the global aspect, the newspaper industry of Bangladesh seems to still hold the market.

The number has only increased the top newspapers that hold 95% of the market share. A number of newspaper and magazines have closed or have been compelled to go online. One of the main reasons for the print industry to lose its reader is the emergence of online newspaper in Bangladesh.