Following two major oil spill incidents within the span of only six months, the government is finally taking a long-overdue initiative to formulate a national contingency plan for oil spills, the environment secretary has said.
The Ministry of Environment and Forest is now finalising the contingency plan by consulting with different stakeholders, Secretary Kamal Uddin Ahmed told a workshop at the city's Cirdap auditorium yesterday.
Bangladesh was supposed to formulate such a plan in 2010 when it signed a memorandum of understanding with India, Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka to formulate a regional contingency plan.
The other signatory countries have already formulated their national contingency plan.
During the absence of a proper guideline, the country suffered two recent major oil spills: an oil tanker capsized in the Sundarbans' Sela River in December last year and three rail wagons containing furnace oil derailed in Karnaphuli River this June. Both incidents caused severe damage to the local biodiversity and ecology of the water bodies.
Regarding the long delayed response in formulating the contingency plan, the secretary said the government had forgotten about the issue after signing the MoU.
“If we had taken the initiative at the right time, the damages from these two incidents could have been avoided,” he told the workshop organised by the ministry.
According to government figures, around 5,000 large water vessels including oil tankers and some 7,000 other small and medium water vessels operate on the country's coast and the inside channels each year, releasing large amounts of oil in the water by both operational and accidental ways.
According to the 2010 MoU, Bangladesh is supposed to prepare a national contingency plan which will help the country get regional cooperation to tackle any oil spill disaster.
As per the document, the government has to select a designated authority which will be the focal point of the contingency plan.
According to the MoU, the countries are supposed to cooperate with each other during oil spills by sharing information and technical support with each other to manage such disasters.
