Bangladesh is a small and densely populated country with an area of about 1,47,570 square kilometers. It long coastal belt of about 710 km which is enriched with natural resources specially fish and other aquatic species of different varieties and has been the focal point of different economic activities. Most of these seashore areas are situated in Chittagong. Sitakund is a seashore area situated a few kilometers north of Chittagong where most of the ships breaking yards are concentrated. Ship breaking industry has not been developed in a day. It has been developed gradually in Bangladesh passing through various stages of its development at in international level. Though the ship breaking in Bangladesh started in sixties, commercially it started in a late seventies. The only ship breaking industry of the country has been developed in Sitakund areas, Chittagong. There are about 20 forward backward linkage industries based on this ship breaking. Now, there are about 20 ship breaking yards in Sitakund where thousand and hundreds of labour are working. The working are all engaged in gangerous physical labour but they don’t have safety equipments liks helmets, goggles, gloves, boots and work suits, medical facilities and moreover financial security. Over the last twenty years more than 400 workers have been killed and 6000 seriously injured accoding to the Bangladeshi media. The explosion of the Iranian tanker TT Dena on 31may 2000 alone is sad to have caused 50 deaths. To this toll must be added thousands of causes of irreversible disease which have occurred and will occur in future due to the toxic materials that are handled without minimum precautions or protective carse. It can be said that the human right are seriously violated in this significant and potential industry in our country. Ship breaking is a potential industry for Bangladesh. At present, the position of Bangladesh is third in the world for ship breaking ............Admin Azhar
Posted on: Sat, 26 Oct 2013 17:17:52 +0000