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Furniture industry people have urged the government to increase import duty on finished furniture while reduce tax on their export to pave the way for wider access of Bangladeshi furniture to international market.
   The local furniture sector depends on imported woods and other raw materials and it pushes up the prices of local furniture, they told New Age at the Fifth National Furniture Fair that began in Dhaka on Monday.
   Industries adviser Geeteara Safiya Choudhury inaugurated the five-day fair at the Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre.
   The Bangladesh Furniture Industries Owners Association in association with the Design and Technology Centre is organising the fair aiming to promote household and office furniture business to compete in the international market.
   Twenty-nine organisations are showcasing their furniture in the five-day fair.
   Moniruzzaman of Otobi Limited, pioneering furniture producer in the country, said, ‘The main problem in this sector is unavailability of raw materials and we are depended on imported woods and other raw materials.’
   In this regard, owner of a furniture company told New Age that the government could raise tax on imported finished furniture and reduce duty on its export to other countries.
   It is alarming that foreign furniture was flooding furniture markets in all the cities and big towns.
   Design and Technology Centre executive director Atif Dewan Rashid also mentioned inadequate skilled manpower and professional designers in the sector.
   ‘There is no academic institution in the country for making professional designers as well as workers to be employed in the furniture sector,’ Atif said.
   Bangladeshi furniture are usually generally are fixed and it is a problem for flat packaging for shipment, he said.
   In response to a question Atif said, ‘Bangladesh’s export volume in terms of furniture export is nearly Tk 200 crore a year.’
   China, Indonesia, Myanmar and Malaysia are dominating the global furniture markets, he said.
   Geeteara said the government would extend all possible supports to the sector for its growth.
   With the association president KM Akhtaruzzaman in the chair, the inaugural function was also addressed by the association’s organising secretary Eleais Sarkar.
   Akhteruzzaman said that the fair was aimed at promoting local furniture to the domestic users as an alternative to imported items alongside creating scopes for wider access of the local furniture to international markets.
   The fair will remain open from 9:00am to 9:00pm every day and no entry fee is required for the visitors.
   The fair showcases wooden, cane, steel and plastic furniture, wooden floors, hospital equipment, office equipments all household furniture items and furniture for children.

The Anti-Corruption Commission will press graft charges today against former BNP whip Khandaker Ashraf Hossain, former prime minister Khaleda Zia’s political secretary Harris Chowdhury, Orion Group chairman Obaidul Karim, and two others.
   The commission also has decided to lodge a case against the Rajshahi mayor, Mizanur Rahman Minu, and his wife Salma Rahman and another against Khaleda Zia’s assignment officer Firoz Iqbal Mahmud and his wife Imtiaz Begum for owning wealth beyond their know sources of income, ACC director general (administration) Hanif Iqbal told a news briefing on Monday.
   ACC investigators have found Minu and his wife own Tk 3.59 crore in illegal wealth and they hid information of wealth worth Tk 2.90 crore in their wealth statement submitted to the commission, Hanif said.
   Firoz Iqbal and his wife are accused of owning ill-gotten wealth worth Tk 1.47 crore and of using a vehicle of the LGRD and co-operatives ministry for personal activities without the government’s permission, said the ACC DG, adding the unauthorised use of the government vehicle inflicted a loss of Tk 34.90 lakh on the exchequer.
   He also said the ACC had served a notice on Alauddin Chowdhury, an assistant personal secretary to the detained former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, asking him to submit his wealth statement in seven working days.
   The investigation officer of the case Shafiul Alam told newsmen, ‘The charge-sheet will be submitted along with an appeal for issuing warrants for arrest of Ashraf Harris, and Obaidul.’
   The two others accused in the case are Harris’s brother-in-law Masum Ahmed and driver Abdus Salam, now in jail, while Ashraf, Harris, and Obaidul are absconding. Obaidul presented an Infiniti car to Harris as a bribe for facilitating Obaidul getting the contract for constructing the proposed Gulshan-Jatrabari flyover. Ashraf had purchased the car free of tax as a member of parliament and later sold it to Obaidul, evading taxes.
   After 1/11, Harris tried to sell the car through Masum and Salam but the RAB seized it from Khalabagan Staff Quarters in Dhaka on February 28.
   The case was lodged with the Dhanmondi police against the five on June 5.

Misleading promotional campaigns for infant formula milk, in violation of the laws, are responsible for the decline of breast-feeding and increase in infant malnutrition in the country.
   A baby should be put to its mother’s breast for sucking milk within an hour after birth because this can prevent infant mortality by one-third, said Fatima Parveen Chowdhury, director of the Institute of Public Health and Nutrition, on Monday.
   She was speaking at a media workshop on ‘Breast Milk Substitute (BMS) Code’, jointly organised by IPHN and the Health Reporters Forum at the institute’s auditorium in Mohakhali.
   The workshop was chaired by Prof Fatima Parveen Chowdhury, and Muhammad Jahangir, joint secretary of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, was present as chief guest. The forum’s president, Alpha Arzu, and its vice-president, Proteek Ejaz, were present, along with others.
   Dr Fatima said that the companies destroy the confidence of a mother by misleading propaganda on infant feeding and influence them to feed the infant formula milk rather than her breast’s milk. Most of the mothers are taken in by false advertisements because of their lack of awareness.
   Labin Rahman of the Bangladesh Breast Feeding Foundation presented the keynote paper on Breast Milk Substitute Act.
   Describing the adverse impacts of untruthful marketing tactics on infant health, Labin termed the malnutrition caused by formula milk feeding as ‘commerciogenic malnutrition’.
   ‘The national code for breast milk substitutes was framed to promote breastfeeding by regulating the marketing of breast milk substitutes,’ she said.
   Identifying inappropriate hospital routines that undermine breastfeeding, Labin said, ‘It took half a century before breastfeeding became an acceptable topic for government action.’
   ‘Some brands of imported baby milk powder, now on sale in the markets, have been found to be sub-standard, and pose a serious threat to infant health,’ said Dr Fatima.
   ‘Our investigations have found that five companies dealing with imported baby milk have been in this business for quite a long time. They are selling 13 products under different brand names,’ she said.
   She urged the media to play a significant role in raising public awareness of the importance of breast milk feeding.
   ‘The aggressive and unethical marketing by formula milk companies directly violates the Breast Milk Substitute Regulation Ordinance,’ she pointed out.
   According to the ordinance, it is strictly prohibited for companies to give gifts to the doctors in the hospitals, clinics or other medical centres to persuade the doctors to prescribe their products to the mothers for feeding their babies.
   There are also restrictions on advertisements for infant formula milk products in the media.
   The Breast Milk Substitutes Ordinance was promulgated in Bangladesh in 1984, the first amendment to it was made in 1990, and additional rules were made in 1993.
   ‘We are also campaigning vigorously for adequate nutrition of the mother, because a malnourished mother sometimes fails to feed her baby breast milk and is compelled to use formula milk, which also causes financial hardship to the family apart from health hazards to the baby,’ said Dr Fatima.
   However, the rate of breastfed children is about 80 per cent, while less than 80 per cent of the babies are breastfed at the age of 20-23 months. Less than 24 per cent of the babies suck breast milk within one hour after birth. Only 42 per cent of the babies are exclusively breastfed, that is no food except breast milk is given to them for six months, said an IPHN study.

The National Committee for observance of the Golden Jubilee of the Kagmari Conference has deferred its three-day programme in Tangail to February 7, 8 and 9, 2008. It was earlier scheduled to be held on November 15, 16 and 17.
   The Golden Jubilee of the conference commemorates Moulana Bhashani’s call for national unity of the farmers, labourers and cultural activists in 1957 which intensified the political movement against the Pakistani regime.
   The organisers, at a press conference at the Dhaka Reporters Unity on Monday, said that the home ministry had refused to permit such a programme at the district level.
   The committee’s president and Language Movement veteran, Abdul Matin, told the media that the observance of Kagmari Day will feature jatras, plays, village fairs, photograph exhibitions and the screening of a documentary on the late national leader, Moulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani.
   The National Committee’s general secretary, Syed Erfanul Bari, told the media that the meet is being organised in the spirit of the Kagmari Conference in which Bhasani called for the unity of the common people against the ruling class.
   The National Committee’s leaders also hoped that like-minded political parties, and labour, farmer and student organisations would come forward to make the occasion a success.
   The organisers of the programme, including left-leaning party leaders Badruddin Umar and Sheikh Muhammad Shaheedullah, were present at the press conference.

The CIRDAP will review its past policies to adapt those to the present day needs and map out more effective programmes for poverty eradication in the region, home to two-thirds of the world’s poor people, its officials said.
   The CIRDAP, the regional organisation headquartered in Dhaka, has launched a country-specific study to evaluate the development strategies it pursued during the last three decades and their impacts.
   Development researchers, assigned for the study styled ‘strategic and institutional perspectives of CIRDAP: revisiting its role in the changing context’, in a meeting on Monday discussed the mode and purposes of the study.
   Findings of the study, to be carried out simultaneously in 14 member countries, will be used as inputs for a proposed ministerial summit in 2009.
   Inaugurating the researchers’ meet in Dhaka, local government, rural development and cooperative adviser Anwarul Iqbal called upon the researchers to identify the main issues of the region in the changed global perspectives.
   He also launched a CIRDAP publication styled ‘Agrarian Reform and Rural Development: Sharing Experience from the Philippines’, an outcome of the second regional policy dialogue held in Manila on rural development.
   Development thinkers and researchers from the region will discuss emerging development and related issues at the two-day meeting at the CIRDAP auditorium.
   The adviser expected that the study findings and evaluation would help CIRDAP deliver better services as a regional institution for rural development in the region.
   Nazrul Islam, secretary of Rural Development and Cooperatives Division of the government, said CIRDAP initiated the country-level study covering all the member states in line with the proposed ministerial meeting on rural development in 2009.
   CIRDAP director general Durga P Paudyal mentioned that the organisation’s policymaking bodies felt the need for evaluating the centre’s performances from strategic and institutional perspectives. There is also a need to revisit its role as the contexts changed a lot since its inception in 1979.
   Consultant S Narayan and research director Nasreen Khundker were also present at the inaugural function. Several policy papers on emerging issues of rural development and poverty alleviation will be prepared for the 2009 ministerial meeting planned in Dhaka, which will map out future role of the organisation.
   The CIRDAP groups Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Iran, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam.

The police Sunday night arrested Workers Party of Bangladesh’s Narsingdi district committee’s secretary, Zakir Hossain Palash, from his residence in the Ghorasal Fertiliser Factory’s colony.
   The party’s president, Rashed Khan Menon, and general secretary, Bimal Biswas, on Monday in a press statement demanded immediate release of Zakir Hossain.
   Zakir was arrested under the Special Powers Act and sent to jail for his alleged involvement in a bomb-blast case in Ghorasal Fertiliser Factory on July 11, said the party leaders.

Former district amir (president) of Jamaat-e-Islami was arrested on Monday on charge of violating the Emergency Powers Rules, police said.
   The Kaligonj police arrested Shamsul Haque at the Kaligonj upazila complex.
   Police said Haque, a member of Sura of Jamaat, on Sunday shouted at UNO Hamidul Haque Khan as he refused to give permission for political activities.
   He addressed a gathering of party activists violating the emergency rules.
   A case was filed in this regard.

The customs authorities on Monday detained two persons bound for China with 16 kilograms of white powder suspected to be heroin at Zia International Airport.
   The detained Ariful Islam and Mahmud Ali were heading for China by a Dhaka-Kunming flight scheduled to take off from ZIA at 1:20pm.
   The customs surveillance team at the airport challenged the two men and found 16 packets, each weighing one kg, of white power wrapped with black polythene sheet and hidden among spices and oranges in their luggage.

Khulna mayor Sheikh Tayebur Rahman was shifted to Jessore central jail from Khulna district jail on Monday amid tight security.
   He was sent to Jessore central jail at around 12:30pm after completion of police remand for two times in Khulna.
   Kamrul Islam, jailor of Jessore central jail, told newsmen that the mayor was kept at a ward with division. ‘He is alright,’ the jailor said. Former environment and forest minister Tariqul Islam had also been kept at the same ward.

The National Committee to Protect Oil, Gas, Mineral Resources, Power and
   Ports on Monday demanded that the government cancel Phulbari coal mine deal
   with Asia Energy and oust the company from Bangladesh before finalisation of the coal policy.
   Committee convenor Sheikh Shahidullah and member
   secretary Anu Muhammad
   in a joint statement also expressed concerns over the inclusion of a provision of open-pit mining method in the draft coal policy by an advisory committee.
   They said that the national committee felt that the recommendation for open-pit
   mining was self-contradictory and it would pave the way
   for ‘plunderers like Asia
   Energy’ to steal the country’s resources and destroy environment and livelihoods of the people.
   The conservationists’ group also demanded action
   against Asia Energy for its ‘illegal’ activities like raising money through London Stock Exchange showing Phulbari coal field and publishing advertisements in different newspapers.

Health experts and social activists said the family, the society as well as the state should join hands and take initiatives for rehabilitating the people suffering from mental impairments.
   Mentally-impaired people need special care and attention, they said at the seminar on mental ailments at the Dhaka Community Hospital on Monday.
   The first-day sessions of the two-day seminar organised by the DCH were chaired by professor Mahmudur Rahman and Dr Dipu Moni, said a press release.
   Dr Mushtaq Ahmed, Dr Shamima Ferdous, Dr Barkatullah, Kazi Momtaz Begum, Masud Rana Sikder and Sajeda Humayun Kabir spoke on the occasion.
   Parents of a number of intellectually-impaired persons took part in the open discussion at the seminar.
   Prof Quazi Quamruzzaman, chairman of Dhaka Community Hospital, spoke at the concluding session on the first day of the seminar.

Three persons were killed and another was injured in three road accidents in Gazipur on Monday.
   One of the deceased was identified as Khaled Saifullah, 15, son of Solaiman of Gajariapara village under sadar upazila of the district.
   Witnesses said Khaled and one of his friends, who could not be immediately identified, were riding a motorbike. When they reached in front of the Bhawal National Park on Dhaka-Mymensingh highway at about 11:00am, a speeding bus rammed into the motorcycle from behind, leaving Khaled dead on the spot.
   Local people rescued Khaled’s companion, critically injured, and sent him to Dhaka Medical College Hospital. The bus fled the scene immediately after the accident.
   In Tongi a helper was
   servicing a truck on Station Road in the morning, when another truck hit it from behind, killing the helper on the spot. The identity of the helper could not be known immediately.
   In the third incident, also in the morning, a truck driver was killed when his vehicle collided head-on with another truck in Kharajor area under Kaliakor upazila on Dhaka-Tangail highway.
   The bodies of Khaled and the other two killed in the accidents were sent to Gazipur Sadar Hospital morgue for autopsy. Three cases were filed with the sadar and Kaliakoir police in these connections.