Wed 29 Aug 2007
“Bangladesh now has one of the fastest rates of poverty reduction in South Asia,” said Xian Zhu, country director of the World Bank.In his speech, Zhu explained that 57 percent of the country’s population was living below the poverty line in 1991 and the rate of poverty came down to 49 percent in the year 2000.
Over the period of 2000 to 2005, the rate further declined and settled down to 40 percent as around 6 million people were helped out of poverty, he added.
However, some economists disagreed with the findings in the report, stating that the report only considered economic growth to claim reduction of poverty, but the issue of increasing social discrimination during the same period should also be considered.
All the economists out there, what’s your take on this report?
August 29th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
This article in the Daily Star should knock the complacency out of us:
http://thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=1873
The garments sector is basically in a lot of trouble and when one remembers that next year is 2008 and that all the remaining MFA restrictions will finally be lifted from China, one has to worry about the future of our export base.
August 30th, 2007 at 2:07 am
The drop in poverty is real, but remembering how low the threshold is, it should be taken as a sign of us being on the right track, rather than any cause of complacency or celebration.
Now, we have to make sure this growth in wealth is sustainable. Garment pieces should be able to get produced, get to the port, and get shipped out, even if the rest of our country goes up in flames, or drowns. Our entrepreneurs have to take the lead in diplomacy, and get used to the fact that if there’s something they really want done, they’d better do it themselves. Every government should listen to the presidents of FBCCI and BGMEA as if their lives depended on it, sort of like the current government listens to… you fill in the blanks.
I’ll end with a couple of personal pipe dreams. An elevated expressway should be constructed with one end at ZIA, one exit at Banani, and the other end at Sheraton and Sonargoan Hotels. When foreigners get down in our countrys, their estimates of us and our capabilities inevitably go south after being stuck in the traffic for one hour to get to their hotels. First impressions make a lot of difference, and if they can zoom to their hotels, I think they’ll think much more kindly of us.
Second pipe dream: I’d like to see traffic policemen at traffic intersections at all hours of the day and night in Dhaka City, and I’d like to see them armed, at least with a pistol, and with wireless sets. When driving around in Dhaka at late nights, during past regimes, I always used to wonder how members of the government could make any claims to governance when they pretty much ceded control of our city to others at night.
August 30th, 2007 at 11:44 am
Armed traffic policemen?!
August 30th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Do we have an economist among us? Could you shed some light on the incubation period of general economic policies? I am just trying to understand this development period in relation to the 1990-2006 political governance despite all the despicable crime they did. It might help us restrin the displacement of our hatred to ‘corrupt politicians’ to the ‘politics and democracy’ as a whole. I am under the impression that we are so overwhelmed with the corruption and crime data, may be, we are ignoring some well recognized indices of development during this period. Some quarters might willingly try not to let us look at some positive things of elected governance.
August 31st, 2007 at 12:53 am
SC,
You might want to take a look at this link: http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2007/07/23/economy-now-then-and-before-that/
I leave you to refer your questions to the inhouse economist, Jyoti bhai himself!:)