Riyadh: Bangladesh Adviser for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Syeda Rizwana Hasan today urged the global community for legal recognition of the people’s rights to water, land, food, and environment. She made the call while speaking at the Formal Statements session of the ongoing UNCCD COP16 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, emphasising the urgent need for global action to combat desertification and achieve environmental justice.
According to Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha, Rizwana highlighted the importance of regulating international trade and the transboundary movement of agrochemicals through due diligence in production processes. She stated that public support for financing, technology transfer, and capacity building is vital, but such support should not extend to water-intensive industries or unsustainable agricultural practices.
The adviser noted that as a lower riparian nation, Bangladesh seeks regional cooperation for river basin management and hopes that UNCCD COP16 will guide global and national polit
ical visions toward achieving a land degradation-neutral world. She discussed the challenges faced by Bangladesh, which must feed 170 million people with just 14.8 million hectares of land, one of the world’s lowest per capita land availabilities.
Rizwana warned that rising sea levels could result in the loss of one-third of the country’s landmass by 2050, exacerbating food insecurity. She pointed out that excessive use of groundwater and agrochemicals for high-yield rice production has also caused severe land contamination. The environment adviser shed light on Bangladesh’s vulnerability as an active delta, noting that annual river erosion displaces over one million people, while the country loses 2.6% of its forests annually, double the global average.
She highlighted that coastal salinity has surpassed critical levels over the past three decades, and reduced water flows in 57 transboundary rivers due to upstream diversions have aggravated water-logging and river flow issues, intensifying the nation’s cha
llenges. Rizwana also urged the global community to act collectively for environmental and climate justice, addressing the huge finance gap in adaptation.
She concluded by stating, “Recognising the limits to adaptation, ambitious mitigation action is imperative to save the planet and limit temperature rise to 1.5°C.” Bangladesh reaffirmed its commitment to working with the global community for a sustainable future, calling for actionable outcomes from COP16 to combat desertification and ensure climate resilience.