Dec 15, 2010 | News Reports
In the latest fire accident on 14 December 2010 at a garments factory close to the capital Dhaka 31 workers got killed. The killed are all women and workers of Ha-Meem Group’s Sportswear Factory, located in Ashulia, an industrial zone just on the outskirts of the capital.
This major accident was preceded by another major fire accident on 25 February 2010 at Garib Sweater Factory in Gazipur (also close to Dhaka) killing 21 workers, 18 of them women.
The fire broke out during lunch time. The workers, panicked, ran helter-skelter to escape the flame; many jumped off different floors. The fire raged on the top three floors of the 11-storied factory building. The workers alleged that security guards closed four of seven exit staircases, a typical tactic that the guards resort to when fire accidents break out. The consequences prove fatal, leading to stampede and causing many to jump out of the building to escape the flames. The accident on 14 December was no exception in one of the biggest and supposedly well-managed factories.
For more information on previous fire accidents in the garments industry in Bangladesh and their casualties see the SEHD report.
Dec 8, 2010 | News Reports
The population of Bangladesh has reached a staggering high stage, 164.4 million in a landmass of 147,570 sq. km or 56,977 sq. miles, the size of Iowa (IA) in the United States. There is no doubt this puts Bangladesh among the most densely populated countries in the world, with 2,885 people living per square mile (1114 per sq. km). This was disclosed in the UNFPA report “State of World Population 2010” in October 2010. The report also said the population growth is 1.4% per thousand.
The UNFPA exposé makes the Bangladesh Government unhappy as expressed by the director of planning commission Mr. Ganesh Chandra Sarker who contended the UNFPA figure and claimed that the current population of Bangladesh might be 140.4 million, which was 124.3 million in 2001 at the time of the last population census which takes place every 10 years.
However, the estimate of UNFPA matches with that of The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) Country report 2010 on Bangladesh. According to EIU the population of Bangladesh was 160.0 million in 2008. Its forecast of Bangladesh population was 162.2 million in 2009 and 164.9 million in 2010, which will be 167.5 million in 2011. The UNFPA forecasts Bangladesh population at 222.5 million by 2050.
