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The
foundation of Bangladesh's environmental law can be traced back to
the British-laid legal system. A scrutiny of the statutory laws
prevailing in Bangladesh reveals that about 185 laws deal with or
have relevance to environmental issues.
The statutory laws (laws enacted by the parliament) and by-laws
(rules, regulations, etc. promulgated by the concerned authorities)
are
the primary source of environmental legislation.
The Constitution of Bangladesh enshrines the "right to life and
personal liberty (Article 31 Right to protection of law.
To enjoy the protection of the law, and to be treated in accordance
with law, and only in accordance with law, is the inalienable right
of every citizen, wherever he may be, and of every other person for
the time being within Bangladesh, and in particular no action
detrimental to the life, liberty, body, reputation or property of
any person shall be taken except in accordance with law.
Article 32. Protection of right to life and personal liberty. No
person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty save in
accordance with law. ) as a fundamental right to life.
Although it does not explicitly recognize the right to environment
as a fundamental right, in two recent cases [XLVIII DLR, 1996, p.438
and XVII Bangladesh Legal Digest (BLD), 1996 (AD), pg.1] the Supreme
Court has resolved that the "right to life" enshrined as a
fundamental right includes the "right to a healthy environment"
Bangladesh
is a victim of local and regional environmental problems along with
global problems. The major environmental concerns for Bangladesh are
deforestation, deteriorating water quality, natural disasters, land
degradation, salinity, unplanned urbanization, discharge of
untreated sewage and industrial wastes, and so on. The first
environmental activities in Bangladesh were taken as a result of the
Stockholm Conference on Human Environment in 1972. As a follow
up action to the Conference, the Government of Bangladesh (GoB)
funded, after promulgating the Water Pollution Control Ordinance in
1973, a project primarily aimed at water pollution control. In
subsequent years, various events took place. Before 1992, there were
few regulations to assist environmental protection in Bangladesh.
The regulations, which did exist, included the Pesticide Law (1971),
the Bengal Law for Irrigation (1976) and Environmental Pollution
Control Ordinance (1977). There was no statutory obligation on
conducting EIA until 1992. Due to the pressure from donor agencies,
EIA was undertaken by Bangladesh Government to create an embankment
around the capital city of Dhaka when it flooded in 1991. In fact,
donor agencies or Non Government Organizations (NGOs) have
introduced the culture of EIAs voluntarily because of the
implications of foreign funding.
In 1977, Environment Pollution
Control Board headed by a Member of the Planning Commission and
Environment Pollution Control was established. This was followed in
1977 by the establishment of the Environment Pollution Control
Project, in 1985 by the establishment of the Department Pollution
Control and finally, in 1989 by the restructured and renamed the
Department of
Environment the activities of which are overseen by a Director
General. The Ministry of Environment & Forests (Moef) is the nodal
agency in the administrative structure of the Central Government,
for the planning, promotion, co-ordination and overseeing the
implementation of environmental and forestry programmes. MOEF
oversees all environmental matters in the country and is a permanent
member of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council.
The current EIA system in Bangladesh is inadequate even to ensure
environmental sustainability at the project level let alone promote
environmental considerations at the strategic level. The major
inadequacies are in legislative control of the EIA, procedural
appropriateness of current EIA system, institutional capacity and
public participation). There are no
specific guidelines for conducting and reviewing the environmental
assessment of non-industrial projects, for which, currently, EIAs
done by the project sponsor are sent to the DOE for environmental
clearance by the sectoral line agencies of the government. In fact, the DOE is still following an ad hoc
based procedure for giving environmental clearance of non-industrial
projects. On the other hand, Strategic Environmental Assessment
(SEA) is inherently suitable for taking care of non-project
activities.
In Bangladesh, usually in EIA study, no alternatives in terms of
design, technology or location are suggested (for e.g. EIA of Gas
Infrastructure Development Project, 1994). In Jamuna Multipurpose
Bridge Project, no alternative to the project site was identified in
the EIA report. SEA addresses those shortcomings by offering the
possibility of contemplating alternative technologies, lifestyle
choices, and resource uses. The State of Environment report is
strongly recommending inclusion of environmental issues in various
sector policies in Bangladesh, and making the different sector
policies coherent regarding environment. These aspects are not
considered in the existing policy measures and action programs.
The degradation of the natural resource base and environment in
Bangladesh started with various human and economic development
activities due to a lack of appropriate sector policies, awareness,
and integration of environment and development into conventional
development strategies. The government of Bangladesh recently
realized the need for concern regarding environmental issues, and
started incorporating environment into policies dealing with various
sectors (Bangladesh: State of the Environment, 2001). Various
policies are now under preparation by the relevant ministries that
aim for a sustainable approach towards environmental management and
development (Bangladesh: State of the Environment, 2001). However,
there is no appropriate system in place to examine and assess the
environmental soundness of these policies. This shortcoming might
hinder the quest of Bangladesh towards sustainability especially at
the strategic level.
There is the need to enhance the EIA system by improving the
level of public participation, inaugurating a more effective EIA
legislation and improving institutional capacity. The EIA
legislation should highlight the EIA procedures and the
responsibilities of stakeholders. The procedure should ensure that
cumulative effects are considered and alternative plans are
generated. Public participation in the EIA process should be
enshrined in the legislation and the public awareness should be
improved. The NGOs might play vital roles in this aspect. The
capacity of government institutions (such as DoE) to implement and
enforce the EIA system should be improved upon through training and
the promotion of an enabling environment.
In order to ensure the consideration of environmental issues at
the decision-making level, SEA system should be implemented. In the
context of Bangladesh, it might be more appropriate to institute SEA
as an EIA-based SEA. The present EIA mechanism can be improved by
promoting EIA at the strategic level. The DoE has a vital role to
play in this context by liaising with the different plan and
policymaking bodies to ensure the environmental sustainability of
plans, programs and policies.
source: http://www.eco-web.com/cgi-local/sfc?a=/editorial/index.html&b=/editorial/050307.html
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