Blue economy still an elusive concept as BD yet to device ways to harness sea resources

The entire blue economy is an elusive concept so far for Bangladesh. It has not been able to tap into much wealth except fish and salt from the Bay of Bengal.

Bangladesh extracts only 0.7 million tonnes of sea fish every year while eight million tonnes are caught every year from the Bay of Bengal by regional pirates unlawfully catching fish.

Scientists of the Department of Oceanography and Institute of Marine Research at Chattogram university said they do not have access to in-depth research. As a result, oil and gas, as well as other valuable minerals lying on the seabed, cannot be extracted.
The university lacks the capacity to explore these. This information has been revealed by sources from the Bangladesh Oceanography Research Institute and the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources.

According to sources, even after 54 years of independence, Bangladesh has not yet been able to conduct any survey on marine resources beyond a depth of 100 meters.

After the settlement of sea lanes with India, Bangladesh has acquired two types of resources in the field of blue economy. One is animal, the other is non-animal. Animals include fish resources, marine animals, weeds, etc. Medicine can be made by processing weeds. Spirulina is very valuable among weeds. There are about 500 species of fish in the sea.

There are 36 species of shrimp, 20 species of crabs, and 336 species of snails and oysters. There are also various animals including shellfish, octopus, sharks. Inorganic resources include minerals and mineral-type resources such as oil, gas, limestone.

There are 17 types of important mineral sands. Zircon, rotyle, sillimanite, ilmenite, magnetite, garnet, kyanite, monazite, lyclocine, etc. Monazite is very important. There is a lot of clay suitable for making cement on the seabed. Bangladesh is unable to utilize any of it.

A multi-dimensional survey was conducted by German company Schlumberger to verify the initial potential in the Bay of Bengal. Petrobangla also has information from a two-dimensional survey by ConchoPhillips.

This has also shown the possibility of gas. Extractable gas reserves cannot be discovered without drilling exploration wells. So far, no wells have been drilled in the deep sea. However, the two neighboring countries, India and Myanmar, have found gas in the same sea.

According to a report by Bangladesh Oceanography Research Institute, But Bangladesh extracts only 0.7 million tonnes of this. eight million tonnes of fish are caught every year from the Bay of Bengal.

According to Shaktara, 10 to 12 per cent. Heavy minerals such as ilmonite, titanium oxide, rutile, zircon, garnet, magnetite, monazite, cobalt and other heavy precious metals have been found on the deep seabed. Bangladesh does not have the technology to extract these.

However, it is possible to meet the country's needs by extracting 1.5 million tonnes of salt from the Bay of Bengal every year.

Recently, in a seminar, former chairman of the Oceanography Department of Chattogram University, Dr. Md. Muslim Uddin said, we are able to utilize about 10 percent of the potential. Due to lack of capacity and advanced research, progress is not being made.

The maritime boundary dispute with India and Myanmar has been settled in the international court in 2012 and 2014 establishing sovereign rights over more than 118,813 square kilometers of territorial sea, 200 nautical miles of area, and living and non-living resources of the ocean floor from the coast of Chattogram to 354 nautical miles.

Sources said that the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock took up a pilot project for harvesting tuna and similar pelagic fish in 2020. Although plans to procure three long-liner fishing vessels are in the process to catch tuna, they have not yet seen the light of day.

Taking this opportunity, fishermen from two neighboring countries (India and Sri Lanka) are infiltrating deep waters and catching a large amount of fish while Bangladesh is losing its valuable resources.