Speakers at a working committee meeting on Sunday recommended the government may encourage green energy production by providing tax incentives, in the form of a Corporate Income Tax reduction or accelerated depreciation.
The recommendations were made at the 4th Sustainability and Green Growth Working Committee (SGGWC), held at the MOEFCC Conference Room.
The meeting was presided over by Dr. Farhina Ahmed, Secretary of Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC), Government of Bangladesh.
MOEFCC Secretary put emphasis on controlling the use of plastics in packaging, consumer goods and textiles, and in other sectors and said it cannot be controlled since it has got demand in consumers’ end. To control it, we need biobased and biodegradable packaging solutions as alternatives to conventional plastics, she added.
We encourage private sector to establish their businesses not impacting the environment and biodiversity at any costs and environmental responsibilities comes ahead of business, she said.
Mehedi Hasan, Senior Research Associate, BUILD delivered a presentation on De-carbonization and Circularity for Sustainability of Clothing sector in Bangladesh. RMG sector is the biggest industrial contributor to Bangladesh's carbon footprint at 15.4%, followed by textiles at 12.4%.
He informed that total volume of annual leftovers from Bangladesh’s garment units is around 400,000 tones, if recycled can be a business of more than $4 billion.
The main challenges towards circular fashion industry are lack of infrastructure, fast fashion model, lack of awareness and education on circularity, heavy investment requirements, low to middle end products, import restrictions on cut fabric, poor industrial wastewater treatment, etc.
The Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) will work closely with BUILD as well as other relevant stakeholders to ensure an effective policy on Extended Producer Responsibility for the plastic sector, said the Environment Secretary.
Arif Faisal, Programme Specialist at UNDP Bangladesh responding to a recommendations by BUILD for formulation of an action plan for next 10-year on the SDG-12, he informed that a scoping study has been initiated by UNDP, however he put importance on country-specific data for the strategy.
Chowdhury Liakat Ali, Director, SFD, Bangladesh Bank informed that the recycling industry should get acknowledged in the policy and Green Transformation can be allowed for this sector.
