The Hindu Business Line : `Energy efficiency must get due attention'

ENERGY efficiency and renewable energy should receive priority attention of macro-economic planners, according to Prof Malimullah Miyan, Vice-Chancellor, IUBAT University, Dhaka.

Inaugurating the two-day workshop organised by the Institute of Small Enterprises and Development on Entrepreneurship Development in the Renewable Energy Sub-Sector Asia here on Tuesday, Prof Miyan said that the existing policy framework, institutional arrangement, financing, information and human resources were acting as barriers to the development of the sector. "We need to overcome these issues as energy is one of the major sources of conflicts in the present day world". This is getting accentuated, he said.

South Asia is not immune from the situation, he said.

Dr P.M. Mathew, Director, ISED, said the "renewable energy policies so far talk voluminously on creation of efficient energy markets. However, inadequate development of such markets has been attributed in terms of inefficiency in delivery system. In Asian countries, this implies the ineffective functioning of the public sector agencies, which played the lead role in popularising renewable energy as an alternative."

South Asia accounting for the 20 per cent of the global population is having the lowest per capita energy consumption in the world, Mr Abhjit Chatterjee, representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said.

Rapid development of renewable energy based local economic development has a crucial role in alleviating poverty in South Asian countries, he added.

Others who addressed the workshop included Winrock International Senior Programme Officer, Mr P.R. K Sobhanbabu, Mercantile Bank, Dhaka, Deputy Managing Director, Mr A.K.M. Shahedul Haque, UNIDO representative, Mr Dharesan Unnithan, and Mr George Mathew, Vice-President, Asia, Team Sustain.

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