Published :
Updated :
For all latest news, follow The Financial Express Google News channel.
"The development of Bangladesh is about defying various odds ranging from frequent devastating disasters to managing highly dense population, and emerging from a birth of mythical phoenix to a development puzzle." Amartya Sen and his peers also are one with such views of the keynote speaker at the just-concluded Bangladesh Development Forum (BDF) on advancement of social indicators in Bangladesh.
In fact, economic uplift and human development do not always go hand in hand. But social achievement in Bangladesh has superseded the economic one. Further recognition from the international community following achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), particularly in reducing under-five mortality rate, women empowerment, and poverty reduction, has boosted the confidence of policymakers to effectively implement 'Sustainable Development Goals' (SDGs) agenda.
After its inauguration by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, the first day of the two-day Bangladesh Development Forum (BDF) kicked off with a keynote presentation. The presentation by Dr Shamsul Alam, Member, General Economics Division, focused on 'Implementation of the 7th Five Year Plan and SDGs: Challenges and Way Forward'. It was followed by comments from an eminent panel comprising Sir Fazle Hasan Abed (Chairman, BRAC) Weincai Zhang (Vice President, ADB), Qimiao Fan (World Bank Country Director), Mia Seppo (UN Resident Corordinator), Rensje Teernik (EU Ambassador), Mohammad Muslim Chowdhury (Secretary in charge, Finance) and Md. Nojibur Rahman (Principal Secretary to PM).
Dr Shamsul Alam identified both strengths and weaknesses of the ongoing journey with the 7th Five Year Plan and the SDGs. The summary of his arguments, as postulated in the presentation, is as follows.
First, he highlighted the noteworthy progresses made during the last three years or so: advancement in social indicators, particularly life expectancy, under-5 mortality, fertility rate, enrolment of girls and immunisation has been outstanding. In terms of the 7th Plan progress, the country performed notably in gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate, public investment, curbing inflation, under-five mortality rate, total fertility rate, life expectancy at birth and adult literacy rate. Some indicators, including industrial growth, export and import, government spending on social protection, net enrolment rate in primary education, access to safe drinking water, access to electricity are on track.
According to Dr Shamsul Alam, the most serious attention needs to be on the following:
- Private investment has become a matter of concern.
Private investment in 2016 was 22.99 per cent (77.54 per cent of total investment) against the target 23.7 per cent of GDP. In a similar trend, the fiscal year 2017 records private investment at 23.10 per cent (75.71 per cent of total investment) against the target 23.9 per cent of GDP. The share of private investment in the 7th FYP is projected to be 77.27 per cent of total investment.
- Major issue of sustaining the growth is having little buoyancy in private sector investment, falling behind the target.
- Agriculture growth slowed down as expected but slower than that is needed to buttress total growth rate.
- Remittance shows downward trend as it is recorded at 6.7 per cent and 5.1 per cent of GDP in 2016 and 2017 respectively against the target 8 per cent in both the years.
- Bangladesh has one of the low tax-GDP ratios in the world. The last two years' revenue performance is far below than expected. Nevertheless, tax revenue in the last two years registered 17.9 per cent and 26.6 per cent increase respectively.
- Although public investment has performed relatively well, the government spending has to be increased further.
- Percentage of schools that meet the Student-Teacher Ratio (STR) standard of 46:1 (per cent) is just 61.8 against the benchmark 70.
- As alarming as it is, Maternal Mortality Ratio (per 100,000 live births) instead increased to 178 in 2016 from baseline 170 in 2013.
- Serious attention is required for sluggish Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (per cent) and birth delivery management.
The panelists, by and large, echoed the views of the paper but with an 'overemphasis' on improvement of governance. They were of the view that unless 'grievous' governance improves, the attainment of the SFYP and the SDG could face serious threat. Even massive resource mobilisation, mostly under the private sector and foreign funds, depends to a large extent on the prevalence of good governance.
Sir Fazle Hasan Abed emphasised on coordinated efforts of the government, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the private sector for attaining SFYP targets and SDGs. Drawing upon past experiences of positive outcomes that resulted from coordinated efforts of the government and BRAC, Sir Abed argued that only cooperative and coordinated actions by different stakeholders comprising government, NGOs, private sector and civil society could face the challenges looming large on the horizon. Sir Abed observed, "Challenges are big but not insurmountable".
It is a significant development that Banglasdesh now organises BDF and presides over its sessions. In the past, the BDF used to meet in Paris or somewhere else, and the World Bank organised and presided over the meet.