Staff Correspondent

The proposed budget, placed before parliament just two days before World Environment Day, shows the government is hardly concerned about the country’s environmental degradation.

In last year’s budget, the allocation for the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change was Tk 1,246 crore. This year, the government reduced the amount by Tk 25 crore, and this year’s allocation is set at Tk 1,221 crore.

While this year, the theme for World Environment Day is “Ecosystem Restoration”, Bangladeshi environmentalists believe the government’s negligence in the sector is affecting the country’s overall environmental health.

Bangladesh is one of the most climate-vulnerable country and was ranked at 162 out of 180 countries in the 2020 Environmental Performance Index (EPI), which evaluates the environmental health of the countries and the vitality of their ecosystems.

Upon analysing the climate relevant allocation for environment, forest and climate change ministry, a significant decline between 2017-18 and 2021-22 was noticed.

The amount for the climate relevant allocation was Tk 419.92 crore in 2017-18, which dropped to Tk 379.21 crore in 2021-22.

In the proposed budget, the government allocated 25.8 percent of the development budget for transport and communication, 11.5 for energy and power, 15.1 percent for local government and rural development, 19.7 percent for education and technology, 5.6 percent for agriculture, 6.6 percent for health, 6.4 percent for public administration and three percent for social security.