By Vijay Jayaraj
Whether living in the United States or in a European country, there is a greater chance of wearing a garment made in Bangladesh than in one’s homeland. However, the south Asian country’s dominance in the manufacture of clothing is being threatened by a “green” agenda undermining the power supply.
With availability of cheap labor and plentiful raw materials, Bangladesh is the world’s second biggest garment exporter and trails only China, having surged ahead of other Asian competitors such as India, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand. A key to sustaining this manufacturing boom is maintaining supplies of electricity to run factories.
Made In Bangladesh
The “Made in Bangladesh” label has become synonymous with affordable, quality garments for much of the globe and with the economic growth of a country that achieved independence from Pakistan in 1971 and now shares borders with India and Myanmar. Bangladesh garment-making is more than just another economic sector; it is the lifeline of the national economy.
In a nation of 168 million, the industry employs more than 4 million workers, the majority of whom are women, and accounts for approximately 84% of the country’s total exports. Bringing in $47 billion to the economy, Bangladeshi clothing supplies global brands such as Walmart, H&M of Sweden and Zara of Spain.
In 2023, knitwear export earnings reached nearly $26 billion, while woven garments earned more than $21 billion. Both categories realized year-on-year growth of approximately 11% and 9% percent, respectively.
This success is built on factories that operate within tight schedules to meet international demands and deadlines. They require a steady flow of electricity to light facilities and operate machinery. Any disruption can result in significant financial losses for factory owners and hourly workers.
In a country where the minimum wage for garment workers is around $113 per month (about $4 a day), even a small reduction in working hours makes a huge difference in a person’s life.
Nonetheless, intentional disruptions in the power supply occur almost every day to manage Bangladesh’s chronic shortage of electricity. The exception to these interruptions has been winter when overall energy demand is lower.
The large gap in the supply and demand for electricity also sometimes leads to sudden, unplanned blackouts such as one in October 2022 when 80% of the country (including key industrial hubs of Dhaka, Chattogram, Sylhet, and Mymensingh) were left without electricity.
Lasting for up to eight hours, the “outage affected production in garment factories and small and medium industries” as millions suffered in sweltering heat, according to news reports.
Net Zero and Green Fantasies Present More Uncertainty
Now, the national government in Dhaka has announced plans to saddle the struggling power system with the reliability issues of the so-called green energy of wind and solar as part of a net zero scheme to be “carbon neutral” by 2050. This would be disastrous.
Relatively reliable fossil fuels provide more than 98% of Bangladesh’s electricity and still the grid has issues managing the supply-demand gap. The well-known intermittency of solar panels and wind turbines makes them available only 10% to 30% of the time and sometimes overproducing when they are. Such erratic operational features add complexity, risk of damage to equipment and more uncertainty to an already shaky gird.
Instead of wasting time and money on renewables, the country should focus on increasing its power capacity from conventional energy sources like coal and natural gas. Even analysts supporting “green” energy say the country must allocate more funds towards oil and gas exploration in order to reduce dependency on imported liquified natural gas to fuel plants that now generate 70% of the electricity.
Bangladesh should stick to its current course of giving energy security top priority and reject pseudoscientific theories about climate change that promote unreliable energy sources. The beneficiaries would be millions of Bangladeshi workers, the country’s development goals and clothing shoppers worldwide.
This commentary was first published at Real Clear Markets on June 29, 2024.
Vijay Jayaraj is a Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Arlington, Virginia. He holds a master’s degree in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia, U.K.
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Is there any land available in Bangladesh for large scale wind and solar development? I wouldn’t think so with so many people.
Offshore! Tidal!
In an area prone to cyclones, I would say that would not be a good idea.
and certainly not for 171 M people
I think much of the nation is flood plains and swamps. And all those people.
Some (many) have gone past the scientific arguments regarding human caused global warming to being puzzled as to why the CO2 madness is so strong. A somewhat apt analogy might be the witch trials in Europe and then America. See, “Würzburg witch trials”, “Salem Witch Trials”, & “Witch trials in the early modern period”.
Who convinced, and how, the government of Bangladesh to adopt a net zero path? There is considerable scientific and practical reasons to reject such anti- “Carbon” schemes. Are ignorance and greed involved? The UK and Germany might have a different set of causes. But what?
Color me bewildered.
Like ‘witchcraft’, CO2 is colorless, tasteless and odorless. The former is a useful tool should one wish to steal some old lady’s farm, while the latter is infinitely better suited to the Left’s purpose of overthrowing liberalism.
One can actually taste CO2. It has what I describe as a mild acidic flavor.
That is only after it combines with water… to give, guess what… a mild acid 🙂
The UN has the loudest voice on the planet and they are pushing the CO2 foolishness, and with the internet they have instant access to almost all the countries and their people with few obstacles.
CO2 turned me into a newt!
I got better.
Reference: Charles MacKay, 1841, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. Collateral reading for Groupthink 101
Why we are like that is bewildering all right. But forewarned should be forearmed.
“Instead of wasting time and money on renewables, the country should focus on increasing its power capacity from conventional energy sources like coal and natural gas.” I am under the impression they are doing this already.
I guess we will add that the the long list of deleterious to standards of living that net-zero will bring.
Most countries industrializing / building new power infrastructure will go directly to cheaper renewables. See landline vs mobile phones.
Cheaper than what?
If only such a thing as cheaper renewables existed, there wouldn’t be such a backlash against
renewablesunreliables.Instead we have power-mad politicians, regulators and activists doing everything possible to artificially increase the cost of conventional power while simultaneously doing everything possible to hide the true costs of so-called “green power.”
Guess who is behind most of the backslash? Hint: The same peopöe sponsoring heartland and cfact.
Guess who is behind unreliables? Hint: The same people making that icky gross money from backing it.
And not even earning it like the coal fired power stations have to.
Basically syphoning subsidies and government handouts.
Nope. The people paying the bills are revolting against skyrocketing power bills and unreliable electric service.
People who understand there is a world beyond their own four walls.
People who understand spending $trillions to get to “net zero” is folly that will have no effect whatsoever on the climate.
People who understand that coal, gas, oil, and nuclear have been good for modern life.
People who understand modern life can’t exist without coal, gas, oil, and nuclear.
People who understand the best way to bring the starving billions out of poverty is for them to have access to coal, gas, oil, and nuclear.
In other words, sensible people.
Why would anyone go to supply system that is erratic and unreliable.
Manufacturing doesn’t work that way.
Neither does society.
It is the imposition of these unreliable electricities, rather than the solid reliability of coal or gas, which is holding many under-developed back.
But then, that is the whole purpose, isn’t it.
Stopping warming by 2050 is estimated by Bloomberg’s Green Energy Research Team to cost $US200 trillion.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-07-05/-200-trillion-is-needed-to-stop-global-warming-that-s-a-bargain?embedded-checkout=true
Figuring 2 billion households and 90 percent of the poor means $1 million per household in the developed countries.
Most almost all families would rather have an extra $1 million dollars in the bank and a degree or two of warming.
Their investors want $US275 trillion spent.
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/esg/investors-call-for-policy-unleashing-275-trillion-for-net-zero-2
When world CO2 output dropped by 6 percent in 2020 due to the pandemic the CO2 rate kept going up same as every.
The Sun’s output has been the highest in the last 100 years of any 100-year period in the last 400 years.
The oceans, which have 60-70 times as much CO2 as the atmosphere, have probably been storing up that extra heat, warming the atmosphere and releasing CO2 as it warms like a soda pop
The bigger problem is that when glacial periods occur the oceans cool and more CO2 can dissolve in the cooler water so the CO2 leaves the atmosphere.
At 150 ppm of CO2 photosynthesis stops in most plants and they die and the animals die with them.
In the last glacial period the CO2 level dropped to 182 ppm, only 32 ppm above the extinction level for most land plants.
Glacial Periods usually last about 10,000 years, this one has lasted 12,000 years so a new glacial period may happen at any time and there better be enough CO2 or we are all doomed.
Unfortunately power transmission needs thick wire.
Did you know that your mobile phone would not work if there was unreliable, erratic electricity.
EVERYTHING in your feeble, deluded existence is there because of the availability of reliable solid synchronous electricity.
Yet you would deny that to third-world countries.
That really is disgustingly racist and anti-human of you.
There is nothing surprising here. Another example of government screwing up yet again. If you spy a problem you know government can’t be far away, they are so inept. It is disgraceful.
I’m confused.
Is “Global Warming” going to make more “sweat shops” or the solutions to “Global Warming” going to make more “sweat shops”?
Well, since none of my clothing choices are dependent on the opinions of leftarded stoopidfux this won’t have any effect on me. Wake. Da. Fuk. Up.
A Martian landing on our planet and looking at the energy situation would be convinced that the intent of the world’s rulers is to cut back or eliminate the technologies that support life, and to allow at least half of the planet’s population to die quickly, while the other half will be allowed to die slowly. The fraction left alive will be the rulers, who, of course, never play by their own rules.
civilization …… the price we pay to lose our culture