FisheriesWriting on 12 April 2026, during Jatka Conservation Week, SAARC Agriculture Centre fisheries specialist Dr Md Shariful Islam argued that sparing and refusing to buy young hilsa would refill Bangladesh's rivers, as official output fell to an eight-year low of 5 lakh tonnes.
FisheriesBangladesh produced about 5 lakh tonnes of hilsa in 2024-25, the lowest in eight years, the fisheries minister said on 6 April 2026. In a Jago News column on 11 April, the paper's deputy editor argued that the assurance now had to be matched by action.
FisheriesHilsa output fell for a second year to 5 lakh tonnes in 2024-25 and the average fish has shrunk, researchers and Department of Fisheries officials told Jagonews24 in April 2026, blaming silted rivers, pollution, climate change and overfishing.
FisheriesAt a Jatka Conservation Week workshop in Dhaka on 8 April 2026, Fisheries and Livestock and Agriculture Minister Mohammad Amin Ur Rashid asked scientists to find ways to raise hilsa and jatka numbers without spoiling the fish's taste, so that hilsa comes within reach of ordinary people.
FisheriesOn 7 April 2026 Dr Md Amirul Islam of BFRI's Chandpur river centre said hilsa production had grown but keeping it up needs protection of mother hilsa and jatka, deeper rivers and less pollution. A day earlier the fisheries minister said output fell to 5 lakh tonnes in 2024-25.
FisheriesAt a food distribution for fishers in Lakshmipur on 4 April 2026, during the March-April ban in the Meghna hilsa sanctuary, Fisheries and Livestock State Minister Sultan Salahuddin Tuku called hilsa a national resource that everyone must work together to protect.
FisheriesThe Coast Guard said it seized 42 maunds of jatka, young hilsa, from a Dhaka-bound bus at Dapdapia in Nalchity, Jhalakathi, on 1 April 2026; a mobile court fined the bus's driver, supervisor and helper a total of Tk 5,000.
FisheriesHundreds of people carried off seized jatka (juvenile hilsa) while it was being handed out at the Barishal divisional fisheries office on the night of 7 November 2025. Witnesses alleged that officials had held back cartons of fish; the district fisheries officer denied it.
AgribusinessA hilsa weighing about 3 kg, caught in the Arial Khan river in Bakerganj upazila of Barishal on 7 November 2025, was sold to a local fish wholesaler for Tk 10,700, the fisherman said.
AgribusinessOn 15 August 2025 hilsa supply had risen in markets in Mirpur, Dhaka, and sellers said prices were somewhat lower than the week before, though buyers wanted them to fall further.
AgribusinessOn Friday, 27 June 2025, buyers filled Chandpur's Baro Station fish ghat on the weekly holiday, but traders said daily hilsa trade there had fallen from 400-500 maunds to 50-100 maunds, with a one-kilogram fish selling at Tk 2,300 to Tk 2,400.
FisheriesDuring the two-month Meghna fishing ban in March 2025, about 52,000 fishers in Lakshmipur and Chandpur were not getting government rice aid, Jagonews24 reported. Some fishers alleged irregularities and a demand for money; Lakshmipur's district fisheries officer said registration had no irregularities.
The Nizampur Coast Guard seized 30 maunds of jatka from a Dhaka-bound truck at Mohipur in Patuakhali's Kalapara upazila.
