Rooting out extreme poverty should top agenda: analysts
The government's next five-year development plan must prioritise rooting out extreme poverty by way of allocating more budgetary resources for the poorest of the poor, experts at a two-day conference said.
The two-day conference, Towards Sustained Eradication of Extreme Poverty in Bangladesh, also called for investing more in developing human capital and ensuring quality opportunity so the extreme poor become more resilient.
Policymakers, economists, researchers and development activists also said the country needs to strengthen the government's institutional capacity to support and coordinate extreme poverty eradication initiatives carried out by the government and civil society organisations.
There could be a permanent secretariat within the planning commission to spearhead efforts to eradicate extreme poverty, according to one of the recommendations compiled by the organisers.
The General Economics Division of the planning commission organised the conference in collaboration with Bangladesh Bank and the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) at the auditorium of the National Economic Council in Dhaka.
Riding on steady economic growth in the last one decade and strong investments in socio-economic development, the country has already seen exceptional progress in terms of reducing the number of its citizens living in poverty and extreme poverty.
However, despite decade-long public and private sector interventions supported by multilateral and bilateral donors, extreme poverty in Bangladesh remains high, afflicting 17.6 percent of the population, said Bangladesh Bank Governor Atiur Rahman.
“Amid our devoted movement towards uplifting the extreme poor from the destitute circle, it is also important to make sure that in the long-run they don't get stuck just above the extreme poverty line due to lack of opportunities that impede progress towards better livelihoods.”
He said the sporadic off-and-on attention is never sufficient for quick headway against extreme poverty.
“Besides sustained GDP growth rate, respectable rates, continuous strong engagement and abiding commitment towards opening up meaningful opportunities for all to participate and benefit from inclusive growth will be needed in the diverse programmes tackling various dimensions of extreme poverty.”
The governor added the social safety net programmes need to be designed in a more efficient manner to avoid mis-targeting and to target more and more poor.
Rehman Sobhan, chairman of the Centre for Policy Dialogue, said poverty eradication has to be sustainable, and the economy's expansion has to be all-participatory.
The government plans to bring down the country's extreme poverty rate to 4.5 percent by 2021.
Mashiur Rahman, economic affairs adviser to the prime minister, and KAS Murshid, director general of BIDS, also spoke.
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