Former fisheries and livestock minister Abdullah Al Noman speaks at a review meeting on the just-adopted 'Jalmahal Management Policy-2009' organised by Nagorik Sanghati at the National Press Club in the city.Photo: STAR

Speakers at a review meeting yesterday said the just-adopted jalmahal (open water bodies) management policy does not effectively safeguard the interests of the actual grassroots fishermen.
The provision for keeping local lawmakers and upazila chairmen as advisers in the management committee will create scope for politicisation and conflict, they added.
The speakers said this at the review meeting organised by Nagorik Sanghati, a citizens' solidarity, at the National Press Club in the city.
The government adopted the 'Jalmahal Management Policy-2009' with the cabinet approval on June 23 through bringing some changes to that of 2005.
Dr Moinul Islam, former president of Bangladesh Economics Society, said there is no reason to believe the new policy would bring any meaningful change to protect the genuine fishermen against exploitation by the middlemen in getting the lease of khas water bodies.
“The genuine fishermen community will not be benefited with a management dominated by bureaucrats,” he added.
The management committee headed by a deputy commissioner (DC) is authorised to lease out khas jalmahal among the community. Local lawmakers have been made advisers to the district and upazila committees with the upazila chairmen alternative advisers to the upazila committees.
Local influential and moneyed men pocket the poor fishermen's society and manage lease of the jalmahal to plunder thousands of crores of taka as a feudal system, said Dr Islam.
Lawmaker MA Mannan, elected from Sunamganj, said jalmahal management should be entrusted with the upazila parishad.
Former deputy commissioner of Sunamganj Zafar Siddiq said it is hard to protect the genuine fishermen unless they are empowered with monetary and logistic help and capacity building.
He said the 10,000-acre Tanguar Haor could produce big fish worth Tk 250 crores during a three-year management, but the government earns only Tk 10 crore as lease money.
Land ministry, not the fisheries department, is responsible for the jalmahal management.
AKM Mozammel Haq, chairman of the parliamentary standing committee on land ministry, said the new policy provides that no fishermen society will qualify for the lease of jalmahal even if one member is not a genuine fisherman.
Advocate Robiul Islam in a keynote paper said the country's water bodies are home to more than 5,000 plants, 750 species of birds and 500 species of fishes.
Former fisheries and livestock minister Abdullah Al Noman and researcher Dr Abul Hossain also spoke.
Editor of the Weekly Shaptahik Golam Mortuza moderated the meeting with Nagorik Sanghati President Dr ASM Atiqur Rahman in the chair.