Kazi Zahidul Hasan :
Although Bangladesh has been able to maintain an average 6.0 per cent GDP growth over the last ten years and shown remarkable success in poverty reduction during the period, about 40 million people out of its 160 million population still live under poverty line, apparently haunting economic progress of the country.
“No doubt the economy is expanding rapidly riding on the growth of agriculture, industry and service sectors. But this growth will not be sustainable unless the present rate of the poverty is declined,” Prof Abu Ahmed, a noted economist of the country, told The New Nation yesterday.
He said, poverty continues to be a daunting challenge for the economic prosperity of Bangladesh and it should adopt a coordinated multi-sectoral action plan to overcome the challenge.
“About 40 million people are still living in poverty and of half of them in extreme poverty,” Prof Ahmed said, adding, “Poverty in rural areas is more pervasive and extreme than in urban areas”.
This population is also deprived from the basic rights like education, healthcare and housing and they have little capacity to protect themselves from natural disasters like cyclone and floods.
Considering the fact, the government should come up with specific programmes to help the poor population for coming out from the poverty. The poor population should be provided training and education for generating jobs for them, he said.
He further said, a high and inclusive growth could also help reduce poverty drastically. Now the GDP growth remains stagnant to 6.0 per cent and if the growth could scale up to above 7.0 per cent, the poverty rate will come down to 20 per cent.
A boost in public investment and widening social safety-net programme could also help sustainable poverty reduction in Bangladesh.
According to a statistics of Planning Commission, poverty rate come down to 25 per cent in 2014 from 31.5 in 2010. The poverty rate was 56.7 in 1992.
Poverty rate in Bangladesh will drop between 23.34 and 26.51 per cent of the total population by 2015 provided that the country maintains its current pace of poverty reduction, according to a World Bank study.
“Reducing multidimensional poverty or inequality is a huge challenge for the economic development of Bangladesh. And to gear up the development towards sustainability, elimination of poverty is a must,” said development researcher Dr Zaid Bakth.
He added: The national economy is enpanding, budget is enlarging every year, but poverty remains in the scene due to lack of adequate investment mired by un-friendly investment climate.
There is a dire need to create a supportive investment climate to woo both local and foreign investment. Apart from this, the government should come up with policies to nourish investment, misuse of public expenditure and capacity building of government agencies to ensure quality of the development projects.
Besides, the government should complete of the mega projects timely to stop drainage of public money.
“Such initiatives will not only create employment opportunities for a large section of the people but also help reduce poverty rate significantly,” he added.
Expressing dismay over the present poverty rate, he said, “Although the official headcount of poverty is about 40 million but the real number would be more than 50 million. “This is a huge number and without uplifting them from poverty line, the sustainable economic development is almost impossible,” he commented.
“Bangladesh is on right track on reducing poverty under the Millennium Development Goals,” said a senior planning ministry official.
He said, people are getting out from poverty on rising income and public expenditure. The government has also launched various income generating programmes for rural population of the country to improve their livelihood. “Thousands children and youths of the poorer families are being connected with education and vocational training to prepare themselves with market-oriented jobs to help their families from coming out from poverty,” he added.
When asked, he said, reduction of poverty is a continuous process and the government is working on the issue. Despite a growing population, the number of poor people declined by 25 per cent in 10 years, which is a remarkable success.
“But we are not satisfied with the number as the challenge is huge,” he added.
