She also gave directives for taking immediate measures to clean up polythene, coconut groves, bottles and other garbage from the riverbeds of Buriganga, Shitalakhya, Turag, and Balu to ensure smooth and effective dredging of waterways.
The PM gave the directives while presiding over the second meeting of the committee on water resources and river dredging affairs at the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).
PM's Press Secretary Abul Kalam Azad briefed newsmen after the meeting.
"People must not be allowed to haphazardly extract sands from rivers. Such practices are terribly harming the country's bio-diversity and environment," the PM said.
She said the massive river dredging project being implemented by the government will also be hampered if this chaotic and unsystematic sand extraction is not stopped immediately.
"Before going for sand extraction, it has to be known that from which part of a particular river and how many sands from that will be extracted. If a discipline can be ensured, river dredging and sand extraction can be run simultaneously."
Hasina also asked the ministries and departments concerned for ensuring better coordination between giving permission for sand extraction and other official procedures in this regard.
The premier further asked the authorities for taking punitive actions against those who will not abide by the rules and regulations regarding extraction of sands from the rivers.
About cleaning up the riverbeds, Hasina said the government will give all financial and logistic supports to the departments concerned for removing the river garbage.
There are 53 waterways in the country of which 50 will be dredged by 2018. Six dredgers out of 16 have already started to work through the Garai River.
About the Garai River dredging, she said this river is very important for sound environment of the coastal areas.
If it loses its natural navigability, salinity will increase in the areas bringing down crop production in the region.
When salinity is increased, habitation and breeding of wild animals in the Sundarbans, particularly the Royal Bengal Tigers, will be endangered apart from harming the flora and fauna of the mangrove forests, she said.
As the necessity of latest information and statistics on Brahmaputra and Jamuna rivers came up for discussion in the meeting, the PM said the report made prior to the construction of Bangabandhu Bridge, can be the most fruitful research work to move on for more development of waterways in the two major rivers.
About the recent international summits on climate change, the PM said the international leaders have also agreed with her that climate change and food security are interlinked.
Hasina said the climate change, particularly in the countries like Bangladesh, is severely harming food production, threatening the government's target to attain food security.
She laid emphasis on intensive studies and research works for inventing salinity-and drought-tolerant crop varieties for attaining sustainable food security.
The premier reiterated her call for ensuring a separate fund for the most vulnerable countries to enable them to face the challenges of climate change.
Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury, Planning Minister AK Khandoker, Land Minister Rejaul Karim Hira, Water Resources Minister Ramesh Chandra Sen, Foreign Minister Dipu Moni, Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan, PM's Advisers HT Imam and Mashiur Rahman, State Minister for Forest and Environment Hasan Mahmud, secretaries of the ministries concerned, among others, attended the meeting.
Later, a delegation of Dredgers' Association of Bangladesh called on the PM at the PMO.
They assured the premier of putting in their best efforts to help the government implement its river dredging project.
source:daily star
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