Man is the best of all creations on earth. Yet, in many developing countries of the world, including Bangladesh, this seems to be only a paradox. In Bangladesh, for example, it is man who makes the most environmental pollution to make his own life miserable. He spits here and there, urinates and defecates at all possible places, and throws all unwanted spoilage around the household and street corners. Bad habits of spitting and coughing in public places, sometimes ignoring people very close by, are seen even among people who are educated and well placed in the society. In urban areas, vehicles ply in the streets vomiting black smoke on the nose, eyes and ears of the helpless city dwellers. As a result of these practices, we find rotten garbage scattered in and around the street corner dustbins, human excreta lying on street-side drains and walk-ways, lumps of spits and phlegm on the walls and grounds. These give the look of an indecent, unhealthy environment and lifestyle. The rotten garbage spread bad smell of obnoxious gases and germs of dangerous diseases. Spitting is one of the best means of transmitting various diseases from one individual to another. In urban as well as rural areas, one cannot even visit the big shopping/market places without closing the nose from the unbearable pungent odor and eyes from the distressing sights of the logged drains and urinated surroundings. And the disease spreading potentials of stools and urine lying in open places need not be emphasized. Black smoke of vehicles contain lead and dangerous gases which directly affect human health, particularly young children.
Gastroenteritic attacks, respiratory and cardio-vascular illnesses, skin diseases and worm infestation are therefore very common among the people living in such environments. Children are the worst victims. The diseases rob them of their valuable body nutrients, creating a condition of increased need of nutrients on the backdrop of already scarce supplies. This results in a vicious cycle of infection and malnutrition. Morbidity and mortality rates are therefore alarmingly high in such communities. In such indigent communities, 75% of a child’s time is spent in illness.
The alarmingly increasing rate of urbanization along with increase in population in the urban areas adds an additional impetus to the above problems. Slums in big cities like Dhaka are growing both in number and in size. And with that grow the problems of insanitation, pollution, diseases and deaths. Infant mortality (80 per 1000 live births) and under-5 mortality rates (140 per 1000 live births) in urban slums are among the highest in the world. Those who survive live a miserable life, with infection, disease, hunger and malnutrition as permanent companions. In Bangladesh, more than 90% of the slum children are malnourished and 25% of the families live below the line of hard-core poverty. In urban slums, 39% babies are born with low birth weight (<2.5 kg) compared to 23-27% in other urban areas. The major reasons of infant and child deaths are acute respiratory infection (ARI) (18%), diarrhea (13%), and low birth-weight (LBW) (11%), all resulting from poor environmental management, inadequate health and hygienic practices and lack of nutritional knowledge.
Bangladesh is an agrarian country, with more than 80% population living in rural areas. Environmental problems in rural area and different from those in cities and towns. Here, although air and sound pollution is not a threat, water pollution is a big problem. More than half of rural population live below poverty line and arround 65% are illiturate. Arround 12 % people are totally landless. Although government has taken a massive programme for safe drinking water through tube-wells, most of these tubewells in remote areas remain out of order and the people resort to take water from ponds, canals and rivers for all household purposes, including drinking. Diarrhea and other gastroentritic diseases are a common cause of death in these communities.
Another big problem in rural areas is lack of sanitation. Pucca latrines are scarce and people defecate in open latrines (many males do this in open places). Sometimes, latrines are seen in the same pond where both children and adult bath and from where water is used for all purposes. All this leads to high intestinal worm infestation prevalence and also increases the risk of diarrhea and death.
Because of high rural poverty, lack of education, lack of hygiene and nutrition awareness and because of insufficient rural infrastructure for a decent living, rural people suffer from malnutrition and diseases. Most of these problems can be mitigated by mass awareness and education. Also non-governmental organizations should come forward to help. The government materialize its programmes to reduce rural poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition and environmental problems.
The entire scenario is not always the result of lack of money and lack of formal education alone. There is something more than that. And that is the sense of being a human being, the best creation of nature. This sense is absent in many of us. Extreme environmentally bad scenes are not uncommon even in the posh areas of the cities; e.g. Dhanmondi, Banani, Baridhara and Gulshan of Dhaka. That means - there are many people who just forget that as human beings they can live a more clean and decent life if they wish. It is as if a large section of the population are deaf although they have ears to hear, they are blind although they have eyes to see, they do not think although they have the nature’s most developed brain to think with great power, and in many cases they have the means to keep the environment clean but they would not do that, they do not just care about that. In a word, they are deep in sleep, although they look awake; they are in total darkness, devoid of the devine light of human values. The same is true for rural affluents. Many of them are rich, but are not conscious about the environment.
Enviroprotection and Human Development (EPHD) was born in 1992 as a non-governmental organization (NGO) to address all macro- and micro-environmental issues in general, but it will emphasize on the above stated environmental problems which are micro in nature yet have obvious mega-effects on human health, well being and development. With the combined efforts of a number of highly qualified and expert dedicated persons, the organization is committed to improve human health and well-being through innovative ideas and means of solving the sensitive micro-environmental problems mentioned above. Hundreds of developmental programs have been or are being conducted in the country, many addressing environmental issues. While some progress has seemingly been accomplished in income generation activities, no visible improvement is seen in environmental scene and quality of human life. EPHD thinks that it is mostly attributable to the lack of sensitization and awakening of human instinct as the most intelligent and capable living being on earth. EPHD aims at mitigating this lacking.
The goal of EPHD is to raise the quality of human life through protecting the environment from degradation done consciously or unconsciously by man, both from materialistic and from holistic points of view. This would ensure better health and well-being of the people which in turn would improve chances for better income and productivity to invest more on health, education and nutrition care for children, thus raising the human development index in the long run. The current Human Development Index (HDI) of Bangladesh is 0.365, which ranks 32nd from the bottom out of 174 countries in the world. The target of EPHD is to raise this index to at least double in the next 10 years.
The objectives of EPHD include:
ð To awaken and sensitize people about their being the best creation on earth and to lead a life worthy of humans.
ð To educate and motivate people against environmental pollution and degradation through spitting, urinating and defecating here and there and everywhere.
ð To educate and motivate people against environmental pollution and degradation through improper disposing of garbage and refuse.
ð To undertake effective programs to curb air and sound pollution in the cities through education and motivation of, and if necessary, stringent actions against, faulty vehicle owners and drivers.
ð To undertake effective programs to curb water and air pollution in cities and industrial areas through improper disposal of industrial effluents.
ð To ensure potable water supply, sanitation, environment health education, surveillence and monitoring through community participation involving school and college students, science club etc in rural areas.
ð To work independently as well as in collaboration with the Government in making and implementing effective programs to keep the cities and villages clean and tidy.
ð To supplement Government efforts in improving the environmental and living status of the urban slums and rural areas through establishment of sanitary latrines, ensuring safe drinking water and maintaining a healthy environment.
ð To resist deforestation and to accelerate afforestation through plantation.
ð To provide consultancy service in development programs related to environment, health, nutrition, food and agriculture through research, training and field level work.
ð Conduct perirdic survey on environmental health related problems.
ð Undertake collaborative research activity with Department of Environment, Govt. of Bangladesh.
Chairman
Dr Md Murshed Alam BhuiyanExecutive Vice-Chairman
Professor Harun K M Yusuf, PhDExecutive Vice-Chairman
Professor Ishtiaq Mahmud, PhDGeneral Secretary
Md Abdul KhalequeTreasurer
Md Sohrab AlamExecutive Member-1
Engr. Md Mahbub Alam BhuiyanExecutive Member-2
Iftequar WadudExecutive Member-3
Mrs Shahanaz MalekProfessor Shamim Z Bosnia, BUET
Mr. M. N. Nabi, ERD
Prof. M Shahabuddin, CU
Prof. Quazi Salamatullah, DU
Dr Javed Iqbal, MBBS, PhD
Mr Abdullahel Mahmood
Dr Waliul Islam Khan, MBBS, PhD
Prof. Harun K M Yusuf, Chief Coordinator or
Mr Sohrab Alam, Coordinator (Admn) House# 55/C, Road#06 Banani, Dhaka-1213, BangladeshTel. 880-2-8824313, 8810054
Fax. 880-2-8828474 E-mail. zeal@agni.comMaintained by: Khaleque/Sohrab/EPHD/Dhaka/Bangladesh/revised Dec 00
