Saleemul Huq

In 2009 Bangladesh developed and released the Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan (BCCSAP) which was the first of its kind at that time. It was a remarkable document for a number of reasons.

A recent report from the World Bank has looked at the potential number of people who will be displaced and become climate migrants due to the adverse impacts of climate change around the world by 2050. The report estimated the number to be around 140 million across Asia and Africa, with 40 million in South Asia.

The prime minister, the government and the people of Bangladesh can be justly proud that the country will now be able to graduate out of the Least Developed Country (LDC) status within the next few years.

Many oil-rich countries like Norway, United Arab Emirates and Brunei have put billions of US dollars into Sovereign Wealth Funds through which they invest in interest-bearing assets around the world, either enhancing the amount in the fund, or for subsidising costs of selected services for their own citizens.

Having just returned from a scoping mission to Cox's Bazar to see the environmental situation both inside and outside the Rohingya camps, I am going

At the recently concluded two-day international conference on climate finance in Dhaka, about a hundred national and 50 international experts, government officials, researchers and private sector representatives shared their experiences and knowledge about raising and spending money to tackle climate change around the world.

Bangladesh has a long tradition of preparing national development plans by the General Economics Division (GED) of the Planning Commission primarily through the adoption of five-year plans of which we are currently in the 7th Five Year Plan (7FYP) which runs till 2020.

Bangladesh plans to graduate out of the Least Developed Country (LDC) status soon. One of major element that is part and parcel of this graduation will be the generation and use of evidence and knowledge.

As we move into the new year it is perhaps appropriate to reflect on the significant actions and developments that occurred in 2017 in the arena of climate change, both globally and nationally, and do some crystal-ball-gazing into the future.

As this month of December is both the end of the calendar year as well as the month when we commemorate the 47th year of Bangladesh's existence as an independent country, I am going to write this column with a look into the future over where Bangladesh can go over next few decades.

On December 12, 2015 at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris, France, under the leadership of the then President Hollande, the historic Paris Agreement on climate change was adopted. It was a historic agreement for a number of important reasons.

The second Annual National Conference on Urban Resilience was just held in Dhaka and in three days it brought together several hundred people from different sectors including the central government, local government, mayors and town planners, as well as researchers, academics, NGOs and private sector actors to discuss the future pathways to build urban resilience in Bangladesh.

The 23rd Conference of Parties (COP23) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) ended in Bonn, Germany, on Saturday morning, as negotiations ran overtime by a day.

I have just arrived in Bonn, Germany to attend the 23rd Conference of Parties (COP23) under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) being held here for the next two weeks.

I have just returned from a three-week lecture tour of universities in the United States which took me to New York (Columbia University), Washington, DC (George Washington University), Maryland (University of Maryland) and Nashville (Vanderbilt University).

In the last few days I had the opportunity to visit the Rohingya camps in Ukhia near the Myanmar border to observe the conditions of the refugees as well as the environment of the area. I will share some very preliminary observations on the situation.

As we move on to middle-income status and depend more on our own financial resources, the role of developed countries will need to change so that they become a genuine development “partner” rather than a “donor”.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has declared her intention to make Bangladesh graduate from being a Least Developed Country (LDC) within the next few years and the government has already formally notified the United Nations of this intent.

The recent succession of hurricanes in the Caribbean and floods in South Asia have taken the world over the tipping point in acknowledging that human induced climate change is not only real but is happening already.

While he was still running to become President, Trump Tweeted that climate change was a Chinese hoax. Then after he was elected there was speculation that he might change his mind. This became especially acute when his daughter Ivanka held a high profile meeting with former Vice President Al Gore in which Trump also dropped in.