Speakers at a roundtable meeting said that the country's draft coal policy would fail to protect the national interest in the Phulbari Coalmine Project but keep the interest of a foreign company intact, as it is export-oriented, and lacks integration with the existing energy policy, reports BDNEWS. The roundtable meeting on Phulbari Coalmine Project was organised by the 'Weekly 2000' at the National Press Club in the city Saturday. Economist Dr Kazi Kholikuzzaman presided over the meeting. Workers Party President Rashed Khan Menon, MM Akash, Asif Nazrul of Dhaka University, former PDB Chairman Nuruddin M Kamal and Director of the Institute of Energy Technology of Chittagong University Dr M Shamsul Alam also spoke on the occasion. The speakers said that Bangladesh would earn Tk 400 billion from the Phulbari coalmine project against its expenditure of Tk 500 billion. They said the proposed policy has no clear objective along with product sharing, demand supply and legal issues. Such a project must have public participation and environment impact assessment to identify and quantify the losses under the policy, which are absent in the draft policy, and there is no clear-cut rehabilitation scheme of the government, they added. Speaking on the occasion, Kholikuzzaman said the government could not ensure energy security of the country with the proposed coal policy and the Phulbari Coal Project, a major new coalmine being developed in northwest in Bangladesh by Asia Energy, would be a burden for the country. He said through the project, the country would incur huge loss for rehabilitating 50,000 people and the ineffectiveness of the affected areas after getting only 6.0 per cent of produced coal as royalty. M Shamsul Alam, in his keynote paper said that till January 2006 in all the fields, the extractable gas is 9 trillion cubic feet (TCF), which could met the demand up to the year 2015. Besides, the extractable coal in the four coalmines in the country is 200 to 290 million tonnes, which is equal to 5 to 7 TCF of gas. Rashed Khan Menon said as the coal is national resource, its maximum utilisation should be ensured in local consumption first. MM Akash said the government would have to take the decision violating the people's basic rights and environment destruction against the so-called profit from the coal production at Phulbari. Some discussants also termed the "open pit" mining of the proposed coalmine site as 'destructive' in socio-economic perspective.
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