‘Bangladesh gains remarkable MDG achievement’
Bangladesh made a remarkable success in achieving Millennium Development Goals (MGDs) as out of 33 targets it fully implemented 13, including the one of halving the population living under poverty line, said a final evaluation report.
‘With sustained GDP growth rate of over 6 percent, Bangladesh has been able to bring poverty rate down to 24.8 percent by 2012 against the MDG target of halving the population living under the poverty line from 56.7 percent to 29 percent by 2015,’ said member of the Planning Commission Dr Shamsul Alam while presenting the report at the NEC conference room here today.
Prepared by General Economics Division (GED), the report ‘Millennium Development Goals: End-period Stocktaking and Final Evaluation Report (2000-2015)’ said Bangladesh met most of the targets of the goals-universal primary education, gender equality and women empowerment, child mortality maternal health, HIV/Aids, malaria and other diseases and environmental sustainability.
Planning minister AHM Mustafa Kamal chaired the report presentation programme while commerce minister Tofail Ahmed attended it as chief guest. Prime Minister’s economic affairs adviser Dr Mashiur Rahman, UNDP’s country director Sudipto Mukerjee, planning secretary Tariq-ul-Islam, lead economist of the World Bank Dr Zahid Hossain and FBCCI’s director Benzir Ahmed, among others, spoke on the occasion.
Tofail Ahmed said Bangladesh’s success in achieving MDGs has been acclaimed worldwide. The ability Bangladesh has achieved through implementing the MDGs would help it achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) ahead of 2030, he hoped.
AHM Mustafa Kamal said there is no alternative to increasing investment to achieve SDGs. For this, the government is boosting investment in power and energy sector, he said, adding that there will be no shortage of electricity in the next two years. As a result, there will be industrialization that would create more jobs, he said and hoped that the extreme poverty rate will come down to below 3 percent before 2030.
Mentioning different rural and urban based programmes of the government, Dr Mashiur Rahman said these programmes will play a role to cut rate of poverty. He underscored the need for increasing mobilization of internal resources and boosting local and foreign investments for implementation of SDGs.
According to the report, Bangladesh has successfully met two targets of the goal 1. Bangladesh was well ahead of some regional neighbours in achieving targets of Universal Primary Education as it achieved 98 percent against cent percent enrolment target at primary level. Bangladesh has been maintaining gender parity at secondary education level during the last 15 years. With respect of share of women in wage employment in the non-agriculture sector, Bangladesh outperformed India, Pakistan, Nepal, Afghanistan and Bhutan.
The under-five mortality rate per 1000 live births in Bangladesh is lower than that of India and Pakistan. Bangladesh also performed better that India and Pakistan in case of infant mortality. Over 97 percent people have access to improved drinking water sources.
Source : BSS
