The least developed countries (LDCs) including Bangladesh must transform their rural economic condition to break the vicious circle of underdevelopment and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), according to the latest report of United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad).
The Unctad’s annual publication – LDC Report 2015 – was released here yesterday (Thursday) at a programme organised by the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), the think-tank responsible for launching the report in Bangladesh.
This year the report addressed the structural transformation of rural economies in LDCs, focusing on the critical issues to attain the SDGs globally. CPD arranged a media briefing at the Centre on Integrated Rural Development for Asia and the Pacific (CIRDAP) auditorium in the city where CPD’s distinguished fellow Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya and executive director Professor Mustafizur Rahman were the key speakers. Towfiqul Islam Khan, research fellow of the CPD, presented a summary of the report.
Debapriya Bhattacharya said Bangladesh should focus on both land and labour productivity to transform rural economy as a strategy to attain the next development agenda by 2030.
“It is an urgent need to increase labour productivity on active and promising sectors for transformation of rural economy,” he said, adding that the country would require three kinds of connectivity including rural to urban, industry to agriculture and export to agriculture to accelerate the rural economy.
He put emphasis on increasing per capita income and human development as a strategy to come out of the LDC list. The distinguished fellow suggested the government take a transition strategy before attaining the development agenda for 2030 and the seventh five-year plan.
He also hoped that Bangladesh would graduate from LDC status in 2024. Speaking on the rural economic transformation, Towfiqul Islam Khan said this would require poverty-oriented structural transformation (POST) like agricultural upgrading and diversification into productive non-farm activities.
He said agricultural productivity could be raised by improving input use and agricultural research and development, extending support to disadvantaged farmers and diversifying higher-value crops besides expanding cultivated area.
He recommended strengthening of rural to urban connectivity to expand the market of agricultural products and to support expansion of dynamic enterprises that generate productive and well-paid employment.
