Coastal Zone Policy
Photo: Tanvir Ahmed / Driknews
Bangladesh's coastal zone covers 19 southern districts with a land area of 47,201 square kilometres. The coastal zone is inhibited by 35.08 million people. The coast of Bangladesh is known as a zone of vulnerabilities as well as opportunities. It is exposed to natural disasters like tropical storm, storm surge and downpour. The mixture of natural and artificial hazards, such as earthquake, water and soil salinity, various forms of pollution, wearing away, high arsenic content in land water, water sorting, risks from weather change, etc, have adversely affected life and livelihoods in the coastal zone and slowed down the speed of community progress in those areas. To reduce coastal vulnerabilities, improve the livelihood of the coastal people, ensure the optimum use of coastal resources and to create an enabling institutional environment; the Ministry of Water Resources formulated the Coastal Zone Policy, which was approved by the cabinet on January 17, 2005 and was also published in the official Gazette in March 2005. The Coastal Zone Policy has been developed for all concerned ministries, agencies, private sector, local government institutions, NGOs, and the civil society to put their efforts together for the development of the coastal zone of Bangladesh. The Coastal Zone Policy initiates a process that commits the ministries, departments and agencies to toning and organising their activities in the coastal zone and elaborates the basis for a firm co-ordination mechanism. But so far not much has been done for the development of the coastal zone.
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