Paul Spedding London – The conventional wisdom regarding the recent plunge in the price of oil is that we are seeing a repeat of the 1985-1986 collapse, when Saudi Arabia ramped up production as part of a dispute with other…
Category: Perspectives
Trees felled on BAU campus
When the government is pursuing a tougher forest law to punish the tree plunderers, the Bangladesh Agricultural University authorities have felled 5 trees on campus.
Record global investment in clean energy in 2015 amid fossil fuel price crash
London and New York PRNewswire — Clean energy investment surged in China, Africa, the US, Latin America and India in 2015, driving the world total to its highest ever figure, of $329.3bn, up 4% from 2014’s revised $315.9bn and beating…
World leaders hail Paris deal: ‘best chance to save planet’ – Obama
Delegates from 195 nations agree on new accord to keep average temperature increases below 2 degrees C. US President Barack Obama has hailed the landmark climate accord reached in Paris as strong and historic, calling it the best chance to…
REDD+ Handed in Paris
Jutta Kill Berlin – It’s been 30 years since the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations launched the Tropical Forestry Action Plan, the first global intergovernmental initiative to halt forest loss. Since then, deforestation has continued unabated, and…
The arc of climate justice
by Sherry Rehman Islamabad – It is a painful irony of climate change that those least responsible for the problem are often the most exposed to its ravages. And if any country can claim to be the victim of this…
Step-change must for Paris deal to be ambitious, fair: Civil Society
Bonn, Germany – A review of country climate targets reflecting the twin pillars of science and equity has been released by civil society ahead of the UN climate conference in Paris. By early October, a total of 146 countries, representing…
Europe’s Airpocalypse
by Asit K. Biswas,Julian Kirchherr SINGAPORE – European policymakers like to lecture the rest of the world on air pollution. Asia, and China in particular, is a favorite target for criticism. Indeed, it sometimes seems as if no major environmental…
A fish called development
Oby Ezekwesili , José Maria Figueres and Pascal Lamy Geneva – The just-adopted Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are expected to herald the start of a new era in global development, one that promises to transform the world in the name…
Is UN fit for ambitious new Sustainable Dev Agenda?
As you know, over one hundred Heads of State and Government will gather this week to adopt the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This agenda is intended to make the United Nations (UN) ‘fit for purpose’, but it is important…
The data revolution for sustainable development
Jeffrey D. Sachs , Enrico Giovannini , Robert Chen and Shaida Badiee New York – There is growing recognition that the success of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which will be adopted on September 25 at a special United Nations…
China and the Deep Blue Sea
Nguyen Chu Hoi Ho Chi Minh City – Since December 2013, China has added more than 1,200 hectares to islands in the South China Sea. The geopolitical implications of these land reclamation efforts are well documented: The majority of the…
Who will suffer most from climate change?
By Bill Gates SEATTLE – A few years ago, Melinda and I visited with a group of rice farmers in Bihar, India, one of the most flood-prone regions of the country. All of them were extremely poor and depended on…
UN plan to save Earth is “fig leaf” for Big Business: insiders
Why the new Sustainable Development agenda is “fundamentally compromised” by corporate interests By Nafeez Ahmed The SDG stakeholder engagement process draws selectively on the input of civil society groups to promote its public legitimacy, while systematically ignoring the voices that…
Another great leap forward for development
Javier Solana Madrid – Next month, the world will achieve a milestone for global development efforts. The United Nations General Assembly will adopt the Sustainable Development Goals, an ambitious set of global objectives expected to improve the lives of millions…
The future is old
Brigitte Miksa Munich – The aging of our societies is one of the greatest success stories of the twentieth century. More than three decades have been added to the lives of hundreds of millions of people over the last hundred…
No agnostics in the climate foxhole
– John Hewson SYDNEY – On a recent 14.5-hour flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, I had time to read the columnist Charles Krauthammer’s collection of essays, Things that Matter. It made for a disturbing flight. I have enjoyed Krauthammer’s…
Severe water crisis within next two decades, say experts
Bangladesh will face severe water crisis within next couple of decades due to random contamination of surface and ground water, absence of comprehensive water sharing with neighbouring countries and mismanagement in preserving rain water. According to water experts, although the…
Water management in transboundary rivers
Posted: 29 Jun 2015 Political boundaries are drawn without any consideration to river basin boundaries. There are 263 rivers crossing international boundaries, but only 143 of them have developed any mechanism for co-operative water management, while 158 lack any such…
Statesmanship: The case of Bangladesh
Sinha M. A. Sayeed Dearth of statesmen in a political party may be minimised for a while but poverty of statesmen can barely be minimised for a long period to keep pace and rhythm with time, space and dimension in…
21 climate change fighters
Danielle Nierenberg Recent reports from both the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and theNational Ocean and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have confirmed 2014 as the hottest year on record. Average global temperatures and sea levels are on the rise, and…
Control, out of control
Dr. Sudhirendar Sharma If you need to spot a diabetic friend on the sprawling lawns at a marriage reception, all you need to do is to stretch your sight to the section serving ‘desserts’. Ten out of ten chances are…
Sustainable Development Goals – SDGs
Introduction 1. The Rio+20 outcome document, The future we want, inter alia, set out a mandate to establish an Open Working Group to develop a set of sustainable development goals for consideration and appropriate action by the General Assembly at…
Terrorism: Ultimate weapon of the global elite
Robert J. Burrowes The usual definition of a ‘terrorist’ is simple: a person who uses violence in the pursuit of a political objective. By this definition, the two major categories of terrorist are those political leaders who perpetrate state terror…
Imprisoned democracy threatens Bangladesh with extremism
Mohammad Zainal Abedin, writes from New York Though democracy in 1971 was the immediate spirit and reason of Bangladesh’s liberation war, it is now imprisoned in the country. As soon as Radio Pakistan in its 2-PM news bulletin broadcast on…
Shun violence, force; adopt peaceful means to bridge gap: TIB
Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) on Tuesday expressed deep concern over the on-going inhuman and cruel manifestation of violence and use of force in an unhealthy competition for power at the cost of basic rights of the people and prospect of…
Judiciary must guard the sustainability of Bangladesh democracy
Mostafa Kamal Majumder The outgoing Chief Justice of Bangladesh Mr. Justice Muzammel Hossain has on the last day of his office on Thursday underscored the need for balance of power between the executive, the legislature and the judiciary for a…
The importance of being angry
Robert J. Burrowes Unfortunately, in many circles, anger has a bad reputation. There are several reasons for this. One reason is that we are scared when people are angry at us, so we try to scare people, especially children, out…
Northeast India in 2014: A wait for peace, progress
Nava Thakuria The year 2014 passed away with a major change of perception among the people of northeast India. The residents of the trouble-torn region unanimously urged for peace and development from the authorities concerned. They have also extended whole…
Aus school girls’ green X-mas tree formula!
A group of Australian school girls have discovered a method for keeping Christmas tree green afresh for a longer period by spraying hairspray on the plant. Spraying with hairspray found effective to keeping the tree greener and healthy for long…