Need for a land zoning policy

Fertile farmlands having signboards indicating sites of proposed industries are a common sight on both sides of the country's highways. It is also not known when these will be filled up with earth or sands to build industries.  One can see such signboards along the Dhaka-Chittagong highway. And these are there for years together: none could say when these industrial units will ever materialise. However some farmlands have already been filled up and hectic construction works are going on.
Setting up of such industries without following proper land zoning system will one day cause a severe headache for the country's planners when these highways will become busier with the growth performance of the economy picking up further. Movement of merchandises from Chittagong, the major port, to Dhaka, the capital and onwards and vice versa on the highway will also become heavy in the days ahead. That is why unplanned construction of such industrial units along the highways will one day block its arteries, causing unbearable tailback.      
In a small geographic boundary with over 160 million people, unplanned setting up of industries on alluvial farmlands will simply spell disaster not only for food security but also for smooth functioning of the highways. Shops and markets will follow mills and factories also in unplanned ways to meet the needs of workers and other residents there. Then there will be schools and other civic facilities there for their children.
Such a scenario of the highways reflects the fact that there is still no effective land zoning policy in Bangladesh nor is there any organisation to enforce the Land Use Policy of the government enacted as far back as in 2001. Indiscriminate 'destruction' of farm lands for industries which are still to see the light of the day is now taking place. Although there is no updated statistics, the total cultivable land of 20.2 million acres in fiscal year (FY) 1983-84, according to official sources, dropped to 17.5 million acres in the calendar year, 1997. This indicates a fast falling acreage of cultivable lands in the country.       
Against this backdrop, knowledgeable circles have already pleaded for introducing priority-based land zoning system. They say the land use policy will have to be updated focusing on mapping of land zone. The government should immediately introduce a land zoning system giving priorities to agriculture, housing, forest areas and wild life, water bodies, roads and highways, educational and health institutions, and industrial parks. There can be a 'Khas Land Bank' to preserve all types of records on 'khas' (government owned) land. What is urgent is a region-based land use policy because types of land are not same in all areas.
The fact remains that about 48 per cent of rural households are landless. The country has over 15 million bighas of khas land. Of it, only 12 per cent of agricultural khas land and three per cent of water bodies have so far been distributed. But 54 per cent of the landless who received the khas land could not retain the land in their possession.
A zoning system needs to be introduced to make demarcation of land and water bodies and among agricultural, industrial and residential areas. On the other hand, horizontal housing projects have to be promoted to minimise the use of scarce lands.
Cropland, according to official sources, is decreasing by one per cent every year. In recent years, per capita agricultural land has come down to only 12 decimals (0.05 hectare in 2009). It was 42 decimals (0.17 hectare) in 1961. In neighbouring India, per capita cropland is 32 decimals (0.13 hectares) while it is 2,718 decimals (11 hectare) in developed countries. Researchers also predict the cropland in Bangladesh would go down below 6.0 decimals by 2050 if the present trend continues. A BIDS study says the annual conversion of farmland is 0.56 per cent and the country's loss of rice production stands between 0.86 per cent and 1.16 per cent.
Experts predict unplanned urbanisation rate is so high that the whole country would turn into a city-state by the end of this century if no intervention is made at this stage. The country is losing cropland also due to salinity and water-logging in the southern part, and due to river erosion in its northern part. Cunning developers are now fully exploiting the 2001 law, under which none can possess more than 20 acres of agricultural land. But now anybody can buy hundreds of acres of agricultural land if s/he declares that s/he would use the land for industrialisation.

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