Green activists demand climate resilience fund

Green activists demanded the government focus on climate resilient infrastructure development fund in the proposed national budget for 2018-19 fiscal year.
They made this demand at a press conference on 'Climate Change' organised by a group of civil society networking organizations at the National Press Club on Thursday.      They urged the government to ensure adequate and additional new budget for climate resilient economy and building adaptive capacity of coastal people.
Mrinal Kanti of Bangladesh Indigenous People Network on Climate Change and Badrul  Alam of Bangladesh Agriculture Federation spoke in the event.
Presenting the key demand, Syed Aminul  Hoque said this is good that government is preparing report on climate finance.
The group presented four recommendations for the 2018-19 FY budget. They include ensuring new and additional budget as climate finance out of traditional allocation and transparency and accountability of climate finance.
Quamrul Islam, President of the Federation Environment Journalist Forum Bangladesh, said the proposed climate finance is inadequate to fight climate change impact.
"The government is suffering from lack of capacity of its NIEs (National Implementing Entities) to influence the global climate financing process.
M Rezaul Karim, Chief Moderated of EquityBD, moderated the event saying that government should follow its own climate change strategy plan, identify the climate hot spots for appropriate climate action and allocate budget accordingly.




Mr Badrul Alam of Bangladesh Agriculture Federation said implementing climate finance activities under "Trust Fund" is questionable to mass as this has hardly impacted the climate change arena.
Even this year government didn't allocate money for this fund which is a setback for implementing climate change action plans.
He demanded engagement of the masses with the process, implementation and monitoring of trust fund.
Motahar Hossain, Secretary of the Climate Change Journalist Forum said cyclone SIDR and Aila had damaged major parts of coastal embankments and they need to be constructed to face tidal surge.