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Water and Environment of the
World: A comparatives status
of Sweden and Bangladesh
Written by Mr. Ataur
Rahman
General Secretary
Bangladesh Journalists
rights' Forum-BJRF |
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The world is moving towards
an unbalanced devastating
end due to its environmental
changes. Most of the landed
areas of the rest one fourth
of the earth will go under
water. Millions of people
and other animals will be
endangered and uncountable
financial losses will be
happened in all over the
world. The environmentalists
are expressing their deep
concerns and giving their
urgent warnings to the human
civilizations. They are
continuing with the warnings
like: within couple of years
the earth will no longer
remain peaceful one,
environmental devastation
will be showered in the
countries of the world. They
are also saying, within 50
years most of the European
countries will be back to
the ice age and it will take
several hundred years for
those countries to recover
them from that situation.
All these concerning issues
were discussed at an
international conference on
state of water and
environment in the world
that took place in Stockholm
of Sweden in mid last 2006.
The conference was a set of
seminar and workshops which
were participated by the
environmentalists,
journalists and researchers
from different countries of
the world. The issues of
environment and water are
now given more importance in
not only the European
countries but also the
countries of all over the
world. Europeans are more
concerned because they went
through the most bitter
experiences in the past
regarding the environmental
disasters. And Sweden is one
of the most active
countries, that are working
on environmental issues.
Sweden is famous for
producing electricity from
water. 45 per cent of its
total power production comes
from water-power projects.
The when the water and
environment is concerned,
Sweden comes forward than
any other European
countries. There are lot of
researches on this issues
and the country is more
concerned about it.
Every year the Sweden
International Water
Institute organize an
international conference
which is participated by
specialists, professionals,
activists on environment and
water from different
countries of all over the
world.
Got independence in 1809 the
Sweden received the
membership of the United
Nations in 1946. Norway in
the west, Finland Bothania
Bay in the East, the Baltic
Sea in the south-east and
Denmark in the South West,
this is the territorial
boundary of Sweden. Nine per
cent of the country is under
water either of lake or of
river. The total land area
is 4 lac 11 thousand 497
squire kilometer and the
population is 9.8 million.
Severe cold felt in the
northern part of the
country. Land remains ice
covered for four to seven
months in a year. The people
can see the sun in summer
but it felt cold in summer
also. The summer is the best
time in Sweden. The Sweden
is also a country of rain.
It rains all the year round.
The temperature in Stockholm
remain minus 10 degree
Celsius in January and it
rises up to 15 degree
Celsius in July. There are
29 hector of cultivable land
and besides, 23 crore 61 lac
hector areas are covered by
forest. One fourth of this
land are owned by the state,
one fourth by different
companies and rest half are
private owned.
The forest and water
resources contributes a lot
in the changes of the world
environment. As the
environmentalists say, at
least 70 countries of the
world will face scarcity of
water. Though the seven
tenth of world area is
covered by water but this
water is not useable for the
mankind. According to
environmental scientists, 97
per cent of the total water
of the world is saline water
which hardly used by the
people of the world. 2
percent of the rest are ice
and only one percent of the
total water is useable. And
70 percent of the useable
water is used for
cultivation, 20 percent for
industrial productions and
rest for other purposes.
Water is one of the most
important resource of the
world. The other name of
water is life Like many
other natural resources
water is also not equally
distributed. There are
places where water is easily
available and there are
places where scarcity of
water is extreme. Several
African countries, middle
east countries and some
countries in America face
severe problem on
availability of water.
The earth is floating on
water but there are scarcity
of useable water in almost
all over the world. And many
state mechanism are now
facing problems in
controlling the water
management system. Ghana, an
African country has already
handed over the water
management system to a multi
national company.
Bangladesh is one of the
blessed states in Asia where
water is not so far a big
problem. Natural water is
available here. But water
management system is very
poor. It is a country of
river where at least there
are 302 rivers and numbers
of water bodies and tropical
rain is available. The
country should be more
cautious about the
protection of this natural
resource. The water is
getting contaminated by the
industrial wastes and
garbage.
This is to mention that the
capital of Sweden is a city
of one million dwellers. And
to keep the balance of the
environment the country is
cautious to protect its
water, forest and build up
fresh habitat for the
people. Bangladesh should
take long term plan in this
regard. Bangladesh is a
highly populated country and
the population is the major
cause of its environmental
imbalance. Taking lessons
from Sweden and many other
countries, Bangladesh should
immediately take practical
and effective steps to
ensure its environmental
protection. The developing
countries should play
leading role in this
struggle of environmental
protection, because the
industrialized countries are
mainly responsible for all
these environmental changes.
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