Stress laid on indigenous species of crops to preserve biodiversity

FE Team | Published: October 07, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

Experts at a discussion meeting Saturday stressed the need for producing indigenous species of crops using the traditional knowledge to preserve the country's bio-diversity, reports UNB.
In the country, there are many environment friendly traditional varieties of paddy, which take one-and-a-half month or two to produce rice, they said pointing out that those can be introduced in the flood prone regions of the country.
"Although such varieties of paddy yield less, those can help us to meet our domestic demand for rice," water expert Ainun Nishat told the discussion meeting on 'Role of Media in Sustainable Environmental Governance' at the Jatiya Press Club.
Former Adviser of the caretaker government (CG) Mahbubul Alam attended the meeting as the chief guest while Secretary of Information Ministry Md Didarul Anwar spoke as the special guest.
Presided over by Secretary of Environment Ministry AHM Rezaul Kabir, the meeting was jointly organised by the Ministry of Environment and Forest and World Conservation Union (IUCN) Country Office in Bangladesh.
Ainun Nishat, also Country Representative of IUCN Bangladesh urged the government to send qualified persons to effectively participate in the international environment related meetings for ensuring sustainable development.
Although Bhutan and the Maldives have very few qualified people compared to Bangladesh, they seriously participate in all international environmental conferences, he pointed out.
Former Adviser Mahbubul Alam laid emphasis on producing expertise in the country to effectively face the 'global challenge' emerging from climate change and urged the policymakers to come up with plans to face the situation.
"We will lag behind in many sectors if we don't have proper experienced peopleâ€¦ The decision should be taken at political level for building capacity of the country," he said.