Despite bumper production of watermelon in Dakope upazila of Khulna, frustration has gripped the growers as they are fearing huge losses for lack of buyers and low prices due to coronavirus outbreak.   Farmers said watermelons are rotting in the fields as there is lack of customers at the market due to the restriction in movement imposed to stop the transmission of the deadly virus.   Huge watermelons are likely to be damaged in the fields as those are not being harvested for lack of buyers, they said.

Field-level work on 25 ongoing power transmission projects remained suspended since the coronavirus outbreak in China, hitting hard the power sector development.   According to official sources, most of these projects were either awarded to Chinese contractors or their equipment were supposed to come largely from China.    “Neither the Chinese workers, nor the equipment are coming from China since the pandemic hit Wuhan,” said a top official at the Power Grid Company of Bangladesh (PGCB).    He said many Chinese companies are working as subcontractors as well in Bangladesh’s power transmission sector.    The PGCB official said although coronavirus situation in China has improved, Chinese officials and workers, especially the technicians, are not coming back as the situation in Bangladesh is deteriorating. “As a result, we had to suspend the field-level works on the transmission projects,” he added.     

Abu Bakar Mollah with a pale face was sitting idle on a footpath in Old Dhaka the other day. He is one of those poor street vendors whose livelihoods have been devastated by the COVID-19 fallout.