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Cyclone Sidr that hit the country’s south and south-western districts Thursday night damaged standing crops such as winter vegetables, oil seeds, pulses, transplanted aman paddy and seedbeds of boro rice on vast tracts of land.
   Although it would take some time to assess the losses, agriculturists and government officials concerned said the damages caused to the agriculture sector would be irreparable. It would be difficult for farmers, hit hard by twin floods in July-September period, to overcome the losses, they felt.
    ‘The cyclone, understandably, damaged most of the crops under post-flood agriculture rehabilitation programme. It will really be difficult for the farmers to recover the losses,’ Ibrahim Khalil, former director general of the Department of Agriculture Extension told New Age.
   Standing crops were damaged partially or fully in the cyclone-affected districts namely Khulna, Bhagerhat, Sathkhira, Barisal, Jhalakhati, Pirojpur, Faridpur, Patuakhali, Barguna, Bhola, Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Lakshmipur, Noakhali, Feni and Manikganj, an official concerned said based on initial reports prepared by the control room of the agriculture department.
   Inundation in the coastal belt, tidal surge under the impact of the cyclonic storm and high speed wind sweeping the entire southern region destroyed crops such as transplanted aman of local and high yielding varieties, vegetables namely cauliflower, radish, cabbage, lal shak, mustard oil seed, pulses, and also fruit trees namely papaya and banana.
   In Barisal and Bhola, about 35 to 40 per cent of high yielding variety and 40 to 60 per cent of local variety T-aman has been lost due to gusty wind which will affect the yield of the crop, said agriculturists.
   In Comilla, about 30 per cent of T-aman crops have been lost in the storm which damaged about 20 per cent crops in Brahmanbaria and Chandpur. Massive crop losses are feared as paddy plants in flowering stage cannot sustain such wind speed, agriculture extension officials said.
   The T-aman variety in pollination stage was also severely damaged and would suffer from sterility [chita] problem, said a concerned official of the DAE.
   About 90 per cent of the local T-aman variety is likely to be affected in the greater Faridpur region, said the DAE sources, adding that about 50 per cent paddy was in flowering stage which would mean that harvest would fall to half of the estimate.
   In Khulna region, about five per cent local T-aman paddy variety harvest has been completed while some 50 per cent was in ripening stage and rest 45 per cent in grain-filling stage. About 50 per cent of hybrid variety was in ripening stage and the rest 50 per cent in grain-filling and flowering stages. Paddy plants in such stages are less likely to sustain high wind speed and more exposed to massive crop losses, extension officials said.
   Quoting first-hand reports from agriculture officials of the southern region, a DAE official said papaya and banana trees were heavily damaged in Pirojpur, Patuakhali and Barguna districts.
   Besides, about 70 per cent of different homestead and roadside fruit and forest trees of the southern region were uprooted.

Chittagong Port and Shah Amanat International Airport resumed operation Friday afternoon.
   The activities at the port remained suspended from 10:00pm on Thursday while flight operation at the airport from 10:00pm on Wednesday for fear of cyclonic storm Sidr that ripped through the coastal belt, avoiding the port city.
   Sources in the CPA said they resumed cargo handling at around 3:00pm on Friday. Airport sources said flight operation resumed on the day.
   Different areas in the city, including Patenga, Halishahar, Agrabad, Bakalia, Patharghata, Muradpur, Bahadderhat and Chawkbazar, went under 2-3 feet water due to tidal surge caused by cyclone Sidr.

A government committee has found a number of irregularities in the process of sending nearly 200 Bangladeshi artefacts to the Guimet Museum in Paris for exhibition.
   In another development, French chargé d’affaires in Dhaka Jean Romnicianu, Guimet Museum president Jean-Francois Jarriage and its curator Vincent Lefevre have invited a group of archaeologists and eminent citizens of the country to a meeting at the French mission on Sunday evening to exchange ideas about the planned exhibition of the masterpieces of the Ganges delta in Paris.
   According to sources in the fact-finding committee, none of the documents for shipping the artefacts to Paris bears any countersignature of the authorities concerned. No video documentation of the artefacts has been done and their photographic documentation is also incomplete. The committee has found the descriptions of many of the artefacts inaccurate, inadequate, obscure or missing, the sources said, adding the number of items mentioned in different documents also varies from 168 to 189, which is highly confusing.
   The committee has also not found any connection stated in any official document between the planned exhibition of the artefacts in the Guimet Museum and the much-publicised Sonar Bangla Fair in Paris.
   The government formed the committee on October 25 headed by Abdul Momin Chowdhury, a former vice chancellor of National University. The other committee members are professor KM Mohsin, barrister Tania Amir, Sufi Mostafizur Rahman, major M Shamim Iqbal Miah, and major M Akhlaq-Uz-Zaman.
   In a letter to the cultural affairs secretary on November 6, the committee said it would need some more time to correct the serious flaws in the shipment process to protect the national interest.
   The artefacts were originally scheduled to be sent to the Guimet Museum on October 13 by an Air France cargo plane. But, after hearing a petition, the first joint district judge’s court of Dhaka on October 11 issued a notice on the French ambassador and the cultural affairs secretary, asking them to show cause why an injunction would not be issued against sending the artefacts abroad.
   The petition was filed by former director of the archaeology department Nazimuddin Ahmed, former director general of the National Museum Shamsuzzaman Khan, architect Shamsul Wares, art critic Mainuddin Khaled, and coin expert Nurul Islam.

The Bangladesh Bank has intensified its efforts to realise overdue export payments.
   The country’s overdue export proceeds has decreased from Tk 782 crore at end-April to Tk 754 crore as of end-September, said a BB high official.
   The overdue amount for May is Tk 773 crore, June Tk 774 crore, July Tk 765 crore, and August Tk 761 crore. The central bank has been asking the commercial banks to contact the local and foreign parties concerned to recover the amount, the official said.
   Foreign buyers do not pay for imports in time for various reasons, including flaws in documents, late shipment, and inferior product quality. In some cases, they also deliberately delay the payments to exact discounts from exporters, said the central banker.
   Bangladesh exported products worth $3,077 million in July–September. The export target for this fiscal year has been set at $14.5 billion, compared to $12.18 billion earned from exports in the last fiscal year.
   The highest amount of unrealised export proceeds is in the garment sector, the official said.
   According to the Guidelines for Foreign Exchange Transaction of 1996, both exporters and banks are responsible for unrealised export proceeds. But bankers at a recent meeting strongly protested against the guidelines for holding them responsible along with the exporters for unrealised export proceeds.
   On the issue, the BB official said, ‘The banks also have liabilities for such cases as they are supposed to know the financial and other status of their clients.’
   As of end-September, 15 of the country’s 48 banks are responsible for realising about 90 per cent of the overdue export proceeds. The Sonali Bank tops the list with Tk 187 crore overdue export payments, followed by the Agrani Bank with Tk 109 crore.
   The Janata Bank has to realise Tk 71 crore overdue export proceeds, National Bank Tk 69 crore, Premier Bank Tk 44 crore, City Bank Tk 39 crore, National Credit and Commerce Bank Tk 23 crore, Uttara Bank Tk 17 crore, Rupali Bank Tk 17 crore, IFIC Bank Tk 15 crore, Islami Bank Tk 13 crore, Pubali Bank Tk 12 crore, AB Bank Tk 12 crore, Standard Chartered Bank Tk 12 crore, and United Commercial Bank Tk 10 crore.

The president, Iajuddin Ahmed, has expressed shock at the loss of lives and property caused by severe cyclonic storm that swept the country Thursday midnight.
   He also conveyed sympathy to the affected families.
   Expressing satisfaction over the relief programme undertaken by the government, the president said all concerned should work sincerely to ensure quick distribution of relief materials among the affected people.
   He also asked the authorities concerned to take immediate steps in strengthening rescue operation in the cyclone-hit areas and providing quick treatment to the injured. Iajuddin also expressed his profound gratitude to Almighty Allah as the country came out of danger from the influence of the cyclone.

The UN World Food Programme started distributing 98 tonnes of ready food in several cyclone-affected districts on Friday.
   Some 4 lakh people will be provided with the food, high-energy biscuits, for three days after cyclone Sidr battered the southern districts, according to the Dhaka office of the UN body.
   A release issued in this regard said the food was being distributed in the affected districts by the UN staff, government officials, workers of non-governmental organisations and community representatives.
   ‘We have to move as quickly as possible to get food to the most vulnerable. People’s life and healthy cannot be endangered,’ the WFP representative in Dhaka, Douglas Broderick, was quoted as saying.
   ‘We will review in three days what the cyclone victims need. The biscuits are given in emergency supplies for the initial three days,’ a WFP official told New Age.

An elderly woman died being sandwiched in between hustling people packed in a cyclone shelter in Cox’s Bazar Friday morning.
   The victim was Mostofa Khatun, 70, of Palangkhali at Ukhia in the district.
   Witnesses said the incident took place after several hundred people had taken shelter in the place when Sidr was approaching the southern coast Thursday noon. She visited her daughter’s in the BDR camp area in the town and took shelter in the place along with other family members.
   The body was handed over to the Palangkhali union council chairman, Sifat Hossain, at about 9:30am Friday.
   The deputy commissioner, Sazzadul Hasan, said the victim had suffered from asthma which caused her death. Sazzadul gave Tk 5,000 in cash to her family.