Country loses huge revenue for poor utilisation of river sands
Al Amin :
Despite Bangladesh’s river sands possessing high-valued minerals, the country has long been losing billions of Taka in revenue for lack of sufficient research in the field and investment in exploring potentials and diversified utilisation of the resource.
Researchers said that mineral particles of river sand play a major role in developing the glass industry in the country and the glasses, produced from Bangladeshi sands, are very thick and very high quality, which can be used in all areas of glass including motor vehicle windshields, ships, aircraft and trains.
It will also bring a massive and revolutionary change in the glass related industries and by separating other minerals extracted from sand, it will be used as raw material for various industries including ceramics, electronics, paint, plastic paint and car polishing paper, they added.
Meeting the local demand, Bangladesh can also be able to export goods made from the sands and if the government takes initiatives to explore and extract it by using modern technology, it can be a major source of foreign exchange earnings, they said.
Realizing the importance of Bangladeshi sands, many local and foreign private companies including Carbon Mining Bangladesh Limited, Premier Minerals Limited and Everlast Minerals Limited are very much eager to invest here. But, Bangladesh is still unaware about the resources.
Prof Anu Mohammad, Member Secretary of the National Committee to protect oil, gas, mineral resources, power, and ports, told The New Nation, “It is our main problem that we are unaware about our natural resources.
We must take initiative to build national capability on how to utilize the natural resources and a comprehensive research should be conducted in this regard.”
Although the sands have huge economic value, it has been sold at a minimal price by unplanned river dredging in the country.
The sands are being used only for different construction projects.
According to the Geological Survey of Bangladesh (GSB) and the Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Mineralogy (IMMM), the maximum amount of glass-making raw materials contain in the sands of Kurigram and Gaibandha sections of the Brahmaputra and Jamuna rivers.
Besides, there are around Quarttz Silica 50 Kg, Ilmenite 600 grams, Zircon 400 grams, Rutile 400 grams, Garnet 2.500 Kg and Monazite 100 grams per tonne.
It means around 54 Kg of minerals are produced from one tonne of sands, which current market value is around Tk 4 lakh. But it is sold for only Tk 2000-3000 in our country for construction purposes.
Md Ali Akbar, Director of the GSB, said, “We have enough experts and expertise to assess economic minerals from river sands and search for the glass sands prospects.
We have to formulate projects and observe this type of special work.”
Utilizing the natural resources, formulation and implementation of a “Sustainable Sand Resources Policy” are urgently needed, he added.
Md Jahangir Alam, Assistant Director of the GSB, said, “Strengthening, modernization, arrangement of proper training and equipped with modern technology of GSB are urgently needed to advance the process of making the country economically prosperous by exporting the valuable resources.”
The rare earth elements processing system will also help implement 4IR in the country, he added.
