Md. Akhteruzzaman, Executive Director of the Cotton Development Board (CDB) of Bangladesh, was elected as an Executive Committee Member of the International Cotton Researchers Association (ICRA) during the World Cotton Research Conference 7 (WCRC 7), which was held in Cairo, Egypt from October 4-7, with 220 cotton scientists from 40 countries in attendance. He is the first Bangladeshi member of the ICRA Executive Committee. This year, three CDB researchers, Dr. Md. Kamrul Islam, Senior Scientific Officer, and Dr. Md. Tasdiqur Rahman, Seed Production Specialist, led by Md. Akhteruzzaman, attended the WCRC 7 and presented their research findings orally.After three papers submitted to an open call for oral presentations were chosen for inclusion, these study have gained recognition on a global scale. This conference successfully draws the interest of the international world by highlighting Bangladesh’s recent research and development efforts in the cotton sector.
Additionally, Md. Akhteruzaman, Executive, Director of the Cotton Development Board in Bangladesh and Abd El Nasser Radwan, Director of the Cotton Research Institute in Egypt, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on behalf of their respective organization on October 5,2022.This MoU will help to promote cooperation between two research organization for the development of new short duration and high yielding varieties of cotton, knowledge sharing, capacity building and quality improvement.
The International Cotton Advisory Committee (ICAC), Washington DC, established the ICRA, it is a community of researchers exchanging information for mutual benefit, promote global research collaboration, including assistance in organizing World Cotton Research Conferences (WCRC). The Objectives of the ICRA are: promote and strengthen networking among cotton researchers; rapidly disseminate worldwide information related to cotton; highlight the global and local problems associated with cotton and seek the solutions to overcome priority problems; advise host countries in managing and running the WCRC; help each local organizing committee to prepare all aspects of the conference; have the next Management Committee be established through an election process; serve as an international voice on cotton research; raise awareness of research achievements in making cotton production sustainable as a commodity at the international level; help with training the next generation of cotton researchers and specialists; hosting a database of cotton research activities; enhance the competitiveness of cotton through dissemination of cotton research findings and outputs. Publish research and innovation report as well as arrange webinar among scientists.
Mr. Akhteruzzaman emphasized that this was a unique opportunity for our nation to hold this honorable position to work with the global scientific community for the betterment of cotton as well as upholding our country’s position in international arena. Bangladesh has long history of legendary Muslin cotton fabric production as well as trading across the globe.As our honorable Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s instruction to revive the technologies of golden heritage of Dhakai Muslin, Mr. Akhteruzzaman says he feel proud to engage himself with the efforts to collect and conducting research on revival trajectory, specially research on Phuti Karpas (the main raw material of Dhakai muslin) and ultimately revived the Dhakai Muslin, as an expert member of the team comprises with the researchers of Rajshahi University, Bangladesh Handloom Board, Cotton Development Board and Bangladesh Textile University. One documentary on our great achievement of “Revival of Dhakai Muslin” was shown in the World Cotton Researches Conference at Cairo on World Cotton Day October 7, 2022 which was highly praised by the delegates of the 40 countries.
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