|
LEATHER and leather goods export may witness a surge once the exclusive leather processing zone is set up at Savar with all facilities for checking environmental hazards. The zone will have an integrated water treatment plant, a requirement repeatedly demanded by the international buyers. The World Trade Organisation (WTO) provisions make it mandatory for exporters to have effluent treatment plant in their factory to reduce pollution.
Major importers and consumers of footwear and leather goods in the developed countries are concerned over both process and product-oriented environmental hazards. They expect that exporters fulfil environmental guidelines set by the WTO.
On paper, the government has identified the leather industry as a 'thrust sector' but its actions hardly match its avowed policies for the sector. A number of flawed policy decisions in the past and foot-dragging over a number of important decisions in recent times have denied the leather industry of its deserved success.
Out of the total 207 tanneries of Bangladesh, 186 are located haphazardly in Hazaribagh area in Dhaka where 84 per cent of the total supply of hides and skins are processed in a highly congested area of only 70 acres of land.
The unplanned tanneries at Hazaribagh do not have supporting infrastructure facilities. No tannery in the area has effluent treatment facilities, posing a grave threat to environment.
According to a survey, the tanneries in Hazaribagh discharge about 12,500 cubic metres untreated water daily during peak production period following Eid-ul-Azha and 5,000 cubic metres during lean period. Responding to a long drawn demand of tanners and exporters the government planned to set up the Chamra Shilpa Nagari at Savar at a total cost of Tk 1.77 billion.
Bangladesh Tanners Association (BTA) doubt whether the Hazaribagh tannery, scheduled to be shifted by June 2006, would even start by that time, as its progress is extremely slow. Only eight and a half feet of the 200 acres of acquired land has yet been filled, while another four and a half needs to be completed. The area has to be raised and levelled to an extent that tannery work will not be hampered during floods.
Apart from a piece of acquired land, nothing is there on the site and therefore shifting to Savar might take ages, an owner of a tannery in Hazaribagh said. There are around 65,000 workers directly involved in the tannery industry. They have been operating in Hazaribagh since 1950. So if the place in Savar is not ready for them, they cannot move suddenly. They need both time and facilities.
Initially the Savar project has 195 plots on 200 acres of land, though they had demand 400 acres to include other facilities like dormitories (low cost housing), medical exigencies for tannery workers and their families. In fact, without the extra 200 acres, the shifting will be totally incomplete. Plenty of machinery needs to be set up and a common effluent treatment plant (CETP) to be developed at a cost of Tk 810 million at the Savar site -- all of which along with the dormitory and other facilities require extra land.
A high official of the Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation (BSCIC) admitted that the shifting is lagging behind because the initial work was delayed. An extension of the part for earth filling of the second phase will be proposed so that, the tannery houses can start shifting on time.
Meanwhile, BTA members said in the absence of the treatment plant, there is nothing they could do about the untreated wastes from the tanneries flowing into the river Buriganga polluting the environment. About 243 tanneries out of the total 270 in Bangladesh are situated in Hazaribagh, Boubazar and Kalinagar areas.
These tanneries produce 88 tonnes of solid waste and release 7.70 million litres of liquid waste a day, said an NGO official. Wastes are channelled into the Buriganga through a sluice gate, which often remains closed. The treatment plant will be set up in Savar mainly to avoid health hazards. The plant is expected to purify water from hazardous elements like chromium and asonium affecting water, air and the human body.
Steps have been taken to keep the air clean in the project area. The water containing wastes will be purified in the plant and will be re-used to reduce wastage.
There is no denying that the situation relating to hides and skin trade on the occasions of last two Eid-ul-Azhas improved remarkably. There were no reports of violence over collection and sale of raw hides and skins. Troubles, including those relating to murders, over collection of hides and skins of sacrificial animals were routine affairs during the Eid-ul-Azha celebrations earlier.
Ensuring adequate supply of raw and hides and skin to tanneries and other leather goods manufacturing units is an important responsibility on the part of the government. But it is equally important to ensure proper and healthy growth of the entire leather sector that also includes tanneries, which are regarded as 'dirty industry'.
Currently, Bangladesh is exporting leather and leather goods worth $230 million a year, which is a negligible 0.4 per cent of the world leather market. There is ample scope for increasing its share gradually provided all the stakeholders make an allout efforts to produce quality leather and leather goods at competitive prices. The policy supports from the government in this respect is important, no doubt. But equally important is a concerted drive on the part of the people engaged in the industry itself.
Today's tanners, are not only hard-pressed by the high costs of compliance with increasingly restrictive environmental legislation, but are also faced with a confusion of competing claims for alternative clean technologies. A practical database is required that would enable the tanners simply and rapidly to shortlist the most appropriate technologies for his specific needs, with the aim of minimising the costs. It would be essential for the tanners to be able to identify existing users of the technology and independent leather experts, as well as the manufacturers or inventors, whom the tanners could then separately consult.
The need for an easily accessible source of information on clean technologies was the driving force behind the decision to set up a a suitable database. Environment is contaminated by tanneries to drain out which contains different types of chemicals. Among these chemicals, chrome contributed highly detrimental effect causing health hazards e.g. lung cancers, allergic, skin, gastro-intestinal ulcers and kidney damage. It is also carciongenic inducing brochnogic cancer.
As the tannery industries in Bangladesh are well established, they cannot be shifted without enormous losses. So, at every stage of leather processing, clean technology must be applied. When new industries are set up, clean technology will have to be followed for protecting the environment.
|