Environment Adviser Syeda Rizwana Hasan emphasised the need for urgent lifestyle changes to reduce overconsumption, which she identified as essential to achieving sustainable development in Bangladesh.
Addressing the “Bangladesh Sustainability Conclave 2025” at the Dhaka North City Corporation Auditorium on Saturday, she urged citizens to learn from past mistakes and take proactive steps to ensure a better future.
“We need to correct our course and prepare for the future,” she said, stressing the importance of safeguarding food security, ensuring clean food supplies, and securing access to clean air and water through greater investments and sound policies.
“Bangladesh must evolve into a beautiful, fertile, and sustainable nation. We must focus on sustainability to make this vision a reality,” the adviser added.
Rizwana highlighted the unchecked extraction of white stones as a stark reminder of environmental negligence, advocating for a reduction in pesticide and chemical fertilizer usage, the elimination of polythene bags, and the cessation of hill and forest destruction disguised as development.
She revealed that tax incentives for eco-friendly practices would soon be proposed to the government.
“We already have many policies in place, but the critical challenge now is their implementation,” she said.
Mohammad Azaz, Administrator of Dhaka North City Corporation, presided over the event.
Other speakers included Nayoka Martinez-Bäckström, First Secretary and Deputy Head of Cooperation at the Embassy of Sweden; Farah Kabir, Country Director of ActionAid Bangladesh; Syed Mahbubur Rahman, CEO of Mutual Trust Bank (MTB); Selim H Rahman, Chairman of HATIL; Md Sariful Islam, Head of Communications and Advocacy at Oxfam Bangladesh; and Ahsan Rony, Executive Director of Mission Green Bangladesh.
