Natural resource

Natural resources are most important for a country. There are many states which are straightly depends on natural resources. Bangladesh is a developing country and area is small. We have also some natural resources some are renewable and some are non renewable.

The natural resources are classified into two types 1. renewable and 2. non-renewable.. Renewable Natural Resources are Energy, Water, Fish, Forest etc. and Non-renewable Natural Resources are Gas & Oil, Coal, Rock, Sand etc.

Water is the renewable natural resources of Bangladesh. Bangladesh is gifted with plenty of surface and ground water resources. The surface water resources comprise water available from rivers and static water bodies as ponds, beels and haors. Surface water inflows of the country vary of a maximum of about 140,000 m3/s in August to a minimum of about 7,000 m3/s in February. Two main rivers of the country are the Brahmaputra and the Gangas account for more than 80% of stream flows. The highest flood discharge of the Ganges observed at hardinge bridge in 1987 was 76,000 m3/s and the Brahmaputra observed at Bahadurabad in 1988 was 98,600 m3/s. The minimum discharges of the rivers are 261 m3/s and 2800 m3/s, respectively. The average daily flows of the Ganga is about 10,874 m3/s which reduces to 1366 m3/s during season and increases to 3200 m3/s. The highest flows are about 44,000 m3/s which is usually received in August.

Mineral Resources reserves plus all other deposits that may eventually become available either known deposits that are not economically or technologically recoverable at present or unknown deposits that may be inferred to exist but have not yet been discovered. Geologically Bangladesh occupies a larger part of the BENGAL BASIN and the country is covered by Tertiary folded sedimentary rocks (12%) in the north, north eastern and eastern parts; uplifted Pleistocene residuum (8%) in the north western, mid northern and eastern parts; and Holocene deposits (80%) consisting of unconsolidated SAND, SILT and CL AY.

In Bangladesh not only those are natural resources but also some other elements are known as natural resources but those are the most common and significant natural resources.

DEFENSE

The Bangladesh Army, Navy and Air Force are composed military members. In addition to traditional defense roles, the military is commonly called on to provide assistance to civil authorities for disaster relief and internal security. During the period of emergency rule the military played a central role in the formulation and execution of key government strategies, including the anti-corruption campaign and voter registration. The army is formed and organized along British lines, similar to other armies. However, the army is attempting to accept U.S. Army tactical planning procedures, training management systems and noncommissioned officer educational systems. The Bangladesh military continues to improve peacekeeping operations capability and receive such training from the U.S. military, UN and other nations. U.S.A provided the Bangladesh Air Force four U.S. C-130 B transport aircraft in 2001 under the Excess Defense Article program. These aircraft have improved the disaster response and peacekeeping capabilities of the military’s. The Bangladesh Navy is generally limited to coastal patrolling within the Bay of Bengal and participates in international exercises. A Coast Guard exists under the Ministry of Home Affairs to meet anti-smuggling, anti-piracy and protection of offshore resources. The Bangladesh Border Force also under the Ministry of Home and Affairs addresses anti-smuggling and other missions along the land border. With about 15000 peacekeepers deployed around the world as of 2010, Bangladesh is the second-largest troop provider to international peacekeeping operations.

Bangladesh was admitted to the UN in 1974 and was elected to a Security Council. The government has participated in many international conferences especially those dealing with population, food, development and women's issues. In 1982-83 Bangladesh played a positive role as chair of the "Group of 77" an informal association encompassing most of the world's developing nations. It has taken a most important role in the "Group of 48" developing countries and the "Developing-8" group of countries

Since 1975, Bangladesh has sought close relations with other Islamic country and a role among sensible members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). In 1983, Bangladesh organized the foreign ministers meeting of the OIC.

In recent years, Bangladesh has played a major role in international peacekeeping activities. Under UN auspices Bangladeshi troops have worked or are working in Sierra Leone, Somalia, Rwanda, Mozambique, Kuwait, Ethiopia/Eritrea, Kosovo, Georgia, Congo, Western Sahara, Bosnia, and Haiti.

Women entrepreneurs

Women entrepreneurs have been transforming their small individual house-based business activities into a new business firm or enterprise for the last three decades mostly from the family back-up rather than institutional assistance and they proved that they have a marvelous potential in empowering women and changing society.

Women entrepreneurs are not only playing an important role in household management and woman empowerment but also contributing to achievement in economic development. According to ILO, an entrepreneur is the person who has a set of characteristics that typically includes self-confidence, result-oriented, risk-taking, leadership and future-oriented.

General Secretary of Women Entrepreneurs Association and Director of Institute of Hotel Management and Hospitality Ltd said, “In spite of having implemented rules and regulations by government, women entrepreneurs operating are bounded by some social customs, strong religious barriers and unsatisfactory traditional norms creating barriers in their smooth operation.”

General Manager, Micro Industries Development Assistance and Service commented in this regard: “In view of this problem it is somewhat hard for the organizations to perform their activities and programmers especially in dealing with women entrepreneurs working under several social constraints from getting trade licenses to assess to Banks.”

According to Mashi-ur-Rahman, risk assess management capacity is a main factor for development of entrepreneurship. Our entrepreneur’s especially rural women generally depend on traditional technologies. They don’t have any financial resources. Most of them are depend on monetary support from husband and family, so they are not aware about taking risk by introducing new technology.

Another survey by Md Saiful Islam and Md Aktaruzzaman reveals that most of the businesswomen lack business ideology and professional skill. For example, their survey data reveals 78% females have no knowledge, only 4% rural entrepreneurs have experience and knowledge more than seven years.

Rubina H Farouq has recommended the following to make easy for the women entrepreneurs such as, simplification of sanctioning loan procedures, decrease the rate of interest, loan without collateral security, linking loan with industrial policy and women development policy. Professor Masuda Choudhury emphasized providing necessary financial assistance and skill development programmers to the tribal women especially in Sylhet, Mymensinh and Chittagong Hill Tracts who have affluent and diversified weaving heritage that have liberated tribal women to achieve a self-employed identity.

SME

Higher growth of the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) can help reduce poverty to a marginal level by eliminating various prejudices against labor intensive and creating employment for the skilled manpower in the SME sector.

This was discovered in the Bangladesh Bank annual report for fiscal 2006-07.

The report said, the main reasons behind the SMEs are not entering into manufacturing are financial constrains, technology and policy discriminations. Bank and others financial institutions generally choose large enterprise clients because of lower transition costs and greater availability of collateral.

The Bangladesh Bank report said that the SMEs also fall outside the reach of micro finance schemes and thus compelled to depend on formal sources of funds at much higher interest rates.

The BB report, however, said that other interconnected problems like shortage of short and long term finance, lack of modern technology and lack of promotional support services are main barrier in the way of development of the SMEs sector.

Considering these barrier, the report said, Bangladesh Bank has taken a preferential lending policy to promote the SME sector with the government development policies.

An amount of Taka 2.27 billion was refinanced through different banks and financial institutions under some projects during the fiscal 2006-07.

In Bangladesh, the annual report said, financing small and medium enterprises (SMEs) from banking sector is a long-standing need that has been high on the agenda of the economists and the policy makers.

In Bangladesh the SMEs account for about 45 percent of manufacturing value addition. They account for about 80 percent of industrial employment, about 90 percent of total industrial units and about 25 percent of total labor force. Their total role to export earnings varies from 75% to 80% based on the Economic Census 2001-2003.

The report observed that the SMEs need for bank loan especially medium and long term loan.

The Banks are reluctant to expand loans especially term loans to SMEs and the reasons for banks' reluctance to expand loans to SMEs are perception that the current legal system is unable to defend their interests, funding costs are comparatively high, shortage of access to long-term capital, inability to conduct proper due diligence and the current unavailability of information.

Forestry

Bangladesh is situated in north eastern part of South Asia. It has three major rivers viz Padma, Meghna and Jamuna and their numerous tributaries. The country covers an area of 1,47,570 sq. km and bounded by India and Myanmar.

Forestry is a long-term system. It has various contributions towards the welfare of mankind. The multiple uses of forest resources have been familiar from the advent of civilization. The Forestry sector contributes about 5 percent of the total GDP of Bangladesh. This does not show the true contribution of this sector. The rural population uses fuel wood and other minor forest products free of cost. Forest also plays an vital role in protecting watersheds and hydraulic structure, also in keeping the rivers and ports navigable. It also plays due role in protecting the coastal areas from natural calamities. The role of forest in defending the environment from pollution and its contribution towards bio-diversity is immense.

The participatory social forestry contributes towards rural poverty reduction considerably. In the last 3 years, out of total sale proceeds of timber and fuel wood about 308 million taka has been distributed to 23561 participants.

In 2001-2002, about 2% of the total manpower of the country was engaged in the forestry sector. Many people benefited directly from forestry-related activities e.g. in wood based industry, saw milling, furniture making, establishing private nursery. Besides this in Sundarban millions of people are dependant on the mangrove forest for their livelihood.

Fuel wood is the main wood product required today, Bangladesh needs over 8.0 million cubic meter fuel wood each year. Domestic cooking uses an estimated 63%, which is 5.1 million cubic meter yearly. Industrial and commercial use is also important, which is 2.9 million cubic meter per year.

Wood is the main fuel for cooking and other domestic needs. It is not surprising that population pressure has an adverse effect on the local forests. By 1980 only about 16 percent of the land has been forested.

In Bangladesh the largest areas of forest are in the Chittagong Hills and the Sundarbans. The evergreen forests of the Chittagong Hills cover more than 4,600 square kilometers and are the source of teak for heavy construction and boat making as well as other forest products. The Sundarbans, a tidal mangrove forest covering nearly 6,000 square kilometers is the source of timber used for a variety of reason, including pulp for the domestic paper industry, poles for electric power distribution, and leaves for thatching for living.

Agriculture

Bangladesh has a agriculture based economy. Agriculture is the main producing sector of the economy since it introduces about 30% of the country's GDP and employees around 60% of the total labour. The performance of this sector has an overwhelming impact on major macroeconomic objectives like employment, poverty alleviation, human resources and food security.

Most Bangladeshis earn from agriculture. Although rice and jute are the main crops, wheat is assuming better importance. Tea is grown in the northeast of the country. Because of Bangladesh's fertile soil and normally sufficient water supply, rice can be grown and harvested three times a year. Due to some factors, Bangladesh's labor-intensive agriculture achieved steady increases in food grain production despite the often adverse weather conditions. These include flood control and irrigation, more efficient use of fertilizers, and establishment of better distribution and rural credit networks. 35.8 million metric tons produced in 2000, rice is Bangladesh's main crop. National sales of the classes of insecticide used on rice, including granular carbofuran, and malathion exceeded 12,000 tons of formulated product in 2003. The insecticides not only represent an environmental danger, but are a important expenditure to poor rice farmers. The Bangladesh Rice Research Institute is working with various NGOs and international organizations to decrease insecticide use in rice.

In comparison to rice, wheat production in 1999 was 1.9 million metric tons. Population increases pressure continues to place a severe burden on productive capacity, creating a food deficit, especially of rice. Foreign help and commercial imports fill the gap. Underemployment remain a serious problem, and a growing concern for Bangladesh's agricultural sector will be its ability to absorb extra manpower. Finding alternative sources of employment will continue to be a frightening problem for future governments, particularly with the increasing numbers of landless peasants who already account for about half the rural labor.

Fisheries

Fisheries sector plays a important role in meeting the animal protein requirement, foreign exchange earnings and socioeconomic development of the rural poor by alleviating poverty through employment creation in an agro based country like Bangladesh

There is a strong consumer favorite for fresh water fish. According to the World Bank 75% of the total fish consumed in a year from fresh water sources, with the rural people consuming more fresh water fish (76%) compared to their urban people (68%). The relative contribution of fish to calorie and protein eating from animal sources is also high in the rural sector.

The contribution of fish to the per capita protein and calorie from animal sources, for the rural population, has been expected to be 74 percent and 72 percent respectively, and for the urban population, has been estimated to be 67 percent and 70 percent respectively. The average annual per capita fish consumption of Bangladesh is estimated as 13 kg.

In Employment and Livelihoods about 8% of the total population depends on this sector for livelihood and about 73% of households were involved in subsistence fishing in the floodplains in 1987/88. Around 1 crore people are also involved in fish marketing and fish processing. Thus the involvement of a large section of the people in this area is clear and the pressure on fishery resources is therefore continuing to increase.

Fish and fish products plays a vital role in foreign currency earnings for the country. In 2005-06 an estimated 68,829 tons of fisheries export items earned a total of 45 crore dollar as foreign exchange.

From the above, it is clear that fisheries sector is important for the overall development of our country especially economic development and to meet the various necessity of our society. Fisheries sector has comprehensive contribution to other sectors of the society. We should be more put emphasis on this sector for assuring its growth.