News Report Tannery shifting from Hajaribagh to Savar has become uncertain. Tannery owners have complained that they are not getting adequate support either from the government or from banks. They grouse that factory buildings at Savar have not yet been completed. So far even one storey of the building has not been completed. It is, therefore, impossible to shift the tanneries to the outskirts of the city soon, the factory owners added. Meanwhile, Shahjahan Khan warned the Hajaribagh tannery owners must shift their factories to Savar within the stipulated time, otherwise stern action will be taken against them. If the tanneries are not transferred to Savar immediately the damage to ecology will turn serious and it will pollute the whole Hajaribagh areas. Despite the deadline of relocation of tanneries was extended for several time, the shifting of tanneries from Hajaribagh will not be completed by June next year as the process is moving at snail’s pace, sources said. Meanwhile bdnews adds: The government has yet again backed down on the December deadline for tannery industries in Hazaribagh to relocate to Savar’s under-construction Leather Industrial City. A taskforce comprising six ministers decided at a meeting on Wednesday to give them more time. “Although the Hazaribagh tanneries were supposed to shift to Savar, the industries ministry has said the time is inadequate,” Shipping Minister Shajahan Khan. He said he would discuss the matter with the industries minister and may decide upon a July 2016 ‘deadline’ for the factories to move out. Tannery shifting a far way to go From Page 1 col. 2 Khan said 75 percent work of the industrial city’s central waste treatment plant was complete. “The industries ministry will take steps against those who are yet to complete their Common Effluent Treatment Plant,” he warned. Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation is overseeing the relocation of 154 Hazaribagh tanneries to Savar. Abdur Razzak, chief of parliamentary standing committee on finance ministry, said in January that the tanneries would have to be shifted to Savar by June. Two days before him, Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu said tannery owners had been asked to move ‘within the given time’. Razzak had said the tanneries were supposed to shift within March but it was not possible as the work was progressing slowly. The government later extended the time to July. But after July, the government said the tanneries would be moved to Savar within December. The government has paid tannery owners Tk 2.5 billion in damages and the central bank has announced special facilities for tanneries at Savar Leather Industrial City. The High Court in June 2009 ordered shifting all tanneries to Savar after hearing a plea by BELA. Currently, about 250 million square feet of leather is produced by 220 tanneries, 3,500 small and cottage industries, and 110 large industries. About seven million people are employed by the sector. Meanwhile, 14 industrial units have not even fixed their boundaries. The country’s tannery industry produces on an average 100 tonnes of wastes everyday. The amount, however, increases up to 200 tonnes a day during peak seasons. Our water and environment are badly affected by the wastes of the tannery industry. The government had taken taken a project titled “Hazaribagh Tannery Relocation Project (HTRP)” to shift the tanneries to a new and eco-friendly tannery estate at Harinbari in Savar following a High Court verdict in 2001. Beginning in 2002, the project was scheduled to be completed by 2005 at a cost of Tk 175.75 crore. On October 8, 2007, the Executive Committee of National Economic Council (ECNEC) had extended the time-frame and approved a Revised Development Project Proposal (RDPP). In the RDPP, it was proposed that the project would be completed at a cost of Tk545.36 crore by 2012. The ECNEC, however, again extended the time-frame of implementation of the project to June 2016.
