Sultan Ahmed has been having an excellent academic feat in science, engineering and technology, and an outstanding experience of solid works in development administration. This has made him an expert official with a unique blend of general, administrative and technical abilities. Mr Sultan studied civil engineering and transportation engineering at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), and read sciences at Bhola Government High School and Government BM College, Barisal. He graduated in water resources development engineering at Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee (IIT-Roorkee). He pursued Doctor of Philosophy in water resources development at BUET. Dr Sultan also studied engineering and technology in water resources development and management at Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand, IHE-Delft, The Netherlands, Lund University, Sweden, Tsukuba Science University, Japan, and Gothenburg University, Sweden. He received extensive training in systemic instruments on administration, law, policy, institution, development, and management, etc at home and abroad. He has been a policy and institution expert on land, water, environment, and climate change, sustainable urban planning, energy security, renewable energy, energy conservation, and he is an expert EIA reviewer.

Dr Sultan, a career bureaucrat, has been having more than 31 years of working experience with the Government of Bangladesh, the biggest institution of the country, in various capacities such as Assistant Engineer, Assistant Secretary, Senior Assistant Commissioner and Magistrate, Senior Assistant Secretary, Deputy Secretary, Joint Secretary, Additional Secretary, Director General, Chairman, Secretary, etc in different ministries and public offices. He served as a chief executive official of three most vital organisations namely Department of Environment, Rajdhani Unnayan Kartipakkha (RAJUK), and Power Division. He has a good experience of presiding over criminal courts and extensive knowledge on the Penal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure, the Evidence Act—major substantive laws of the country. He has vast experience of public hearing, and judicial and administrative inquiry. He is a trainer in various public training institutions. He worked at CEGIS, a scientifically independent centre of excellence in providing intellectual and professional services in water, land, RS, GIS, database and environment development and management that functions under the aegis of the Ministry of Water Resources, as a Director of Business, HRD and Administration and a senior professional on policy and institution for a period of over eight years. Dr Sultan served at the Department of Environment as its Director General during January 2018-May 2019, and worked beforehand as Director (Natural Resources Management and Research) at the Department since January 2012.

During his work at the Ministry of Water Resources from January 1999 to May 2003 he was in charge of the bilateral desk of the ministry and was responsible for the planning, formulation, negotiation, implementation of all the portfolios undertaken by the Governments of Bangladesh, The Netherlands, Canada, Japan, Denmark, UK, Italy, Spain, and IDB, SFD, AFD, etc. The portfolios include Char Development and Settlement Project (CDSP), Meghna Estuary Study (MES), Estuary Development Program (EDP), Consolidation and Strengthening of Flood Forecasting and Warning Services, Environment and GIS Support Project for Water Sector Planning (EGIS), Integrated Coastal Zone Management Plan Project (ICZMPP), Modernization of BWDB’s Financial Management Capability, Modernization of the Ministry of Water Resources’ (including BWDB, WARPO, JRC, RRI) Financial Management Capability, Environmental Monitoring Information Network Project for Water Resources (EMIN), Purchase of Dredgers from The Netherlands under ORET Program, Urgent Rehabilitation of Pumping Facilities of G-K Irrigation Project under Japanese DRGA, etc. He represented the Ministry of Water Resources in the bi-annual, annual and biennial donor negotiation meetings held in the Economic Relations Division regarding implementation and formulation of on-going and pipeline portfolios. He worked for the establishment of Bangladesh Haor and Wetland Development Board and Center for Environmental and Geographic Information Services. He worked as a member of the Thematic Sub-Committee (water sector) under the Ministry of Water Resources for development of full PRSP. He was actively involved in the preparation of National Coastal Policy. As a member of the thematic group (Legal, Regulatory and Policy Issues), he contributed in the preparation of National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, a portfolio of the Ministry of Environment and Forest, UNDP, and IUCN–Bangladesh Country Office. He worked as the Member-Secretary of the Advisory Committee for the preparation of National Strategy for Water and Climate Change Adaptation in Bangladesh. He was the Focal Point of ICZMPP on behalf of CEGIS.

One of the major achievements of Dr Sultan’s career is the establishment of Center for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS) by converting Environment and GIS Support Project for Water Sector Planning (EGIS), a technical assistance (TA) project of the Ministry of Water Resources supported by The Netherlands. Dr Sultan, being the official concerned at Ministry of Water Resources, accomplished the whole gamut of work of preparation of the documents, processing them for inter-ministerial clearances, and finally taking approval of the Government of Bangladesh through a full Cabinet meeting for transformation of EGIS project to CEGIS under the Trusts Act, 1882. Dr Sultan then worked at CEGIS for about eight and a half years as a policy and institutional expert, prepared all corporate policy documents, business development plan, and staff service rules, and brought huge businesses to put CEGIS on a strong financial foundation. CEGIS, a not-for-profit public Trust and an independent centre of excellence for environmental and GIS services, works under the aegis of the Ministry of Water Resources. Dr Sultan also provided policy and strategic advices to CEGIS as one of its Trustees during his works as Director General of Department of Environment and Chairman of RAJUK.  

Dr Sultan received extensive training on EIA practice and EIA review during his work at CEGIS. He has been a good trainer on EIA. Dr Sultan worked as the convener of the Environmental Clearance Committee of DoE for about three years. The committee gives Environmental Clearance, EIA approval, Site Clearance, and reviews EIA study reports of red category projects and industries. Dr Ahmed, during his work at DoE as the convener, reviewed more than 583 EIA reports, gave 1,442 environmental clearances, 485 site clearances with IEE approval, and 300 EIA approvals. These reviews and clearances were done for projects and industries of water development, power generation, steel mills, captive power, pesticides, paints, five star hotels, hospitals, paper mills, river dredging, seismic surveys, water supply, cement manufacturing, bridge construction, gas pipelines, gas production, medicine manufacturing, power transmission, roads and highways construction, oxygen distillation, large scale fertilizer, wildlife protection, agriculture, ship breaking yard, ship building yard, infrastructure development, LNG terminal and gasification, tier pyrolysis, tobacco processing, rail network, battery manufacturing, solar power, e-waste management, lubricant manufacturing, leather processing, detergent manufacturing, LPG bottling, bio-fertilizer, metro-rail, elevated expressway, sewage treatment, economic zones, airport extension, surface water treatment, etc.