OneWorld.net (U.S.)

The world's largest summit held in the UN in New York only assessed the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) from September 14 to 16. The MDGs are the targets set in the UN-designed development recipe for the developing countries of the world to attain within 2015 by addressing various underdeveloped sectors, such as poverty, education, health, nutrition, infant and maternal mortality, and environment. Our Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in the UNGA highlighted Bangladesh's success in reaching the MDGs by 2015 as the country has already attained two out of the eight MDGs by reducing the gender gap in education and enhancing access to safe drinking water. She also sought international support to achieve the MDGs.

Of the eight MDGs, the one and the principal goal is to eradicate poverty. In Bangladesh, at the end of the day, millions go to bed without adequate food, while children in droves die from malnutrition and hunger. Poverty is not merely the lack of one dollar a day income, or a matter of statistical bumbledom, but a pathetic story of daily denial of human rights - the right to live in dignity, the right to proper and sufficient food. Benefits of growth do not reach them because of maldistribution of resources.

Bangladesh targets to reduce the proportion of population with income less than one US dollar (PPP-purchasing power parity) a day from 50 per cent in 2000 to about 30 per cent, and the proportion of people in extreme poverty from 20 per cent in 2000 to 14 per cent by 2015 (Goal-I). The official narration suggests poverty head-count ratio declined by one percentage point during nine years between 1991 and 2000. The last 5-year average is alarming: poverty reduction rate is about 0.52 per cent per year in contrast to the required rate of 2 per cent per annum. If poverty reduces at the current pace, it will require about 81 years to eradicate poverty from Bangladesh and 24 years to achieve the Goal-I of MDG.

The second target of Goal-I is challenged by widespread social inequality, which cuts across all key social targets. Second, the rich-poor divide is striking and showing a secular upward trend. The worrying is the gap between the poorest and the rest of the society. A high level of inequality in spatial dimensions and socio-economic categories needs to be seen as factors likely to cause divergence in the progress in the MDGs in the coming decade. Thus despite showcasing some progress in certain sectors, these emerging challenges may impede the steady progress of the realisation of the goals.

Child malnutrition rate in Bangladesh remains among the highest in the world. The two MDG targets relating to universal primary education are claimed to be on track showing impressive achievements in terms of net enrolment rate and completion rate. But the research papers reveal a striking picture. Still 3.5 million small children are not yet enrolled in primary education.

Despite a steady increase in women's literacy since 90s, for some specific government and non-government interventions, literacy rate remains higher for males (47 per cent) than females (36 per cent). Total public expenditure as a GDP percentage fell steadily. Public expenditure in primary education per pupil expressed as percentage of GDP also fell.

It is claimed that the gender gap in enrolment in primary and secondary levels (MDG 3) has been virtually eliminated, but available data suggests otherwise. Interestingly, increasing female enrolment will not ensure gender equality unless the quality education, infrastructure variables are maintained. In fact, gender disparity still persists. Female dropout is higher too. Only 3 per cent of economically active women are engaged in RMG joints and microcredit operations.

As regards MDG 4 official data shows a decline in child or infant mortality from 1992 to 2000 but given the rate of decline since 2001, the targets cannot be met by 2015. The maternal mortality (MDG 5) is claimed to have declined but it is still high. One of the targets in Goal-6 is to halt and begin to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS. Bangladesh is classified as a low prevalence country.

However, there is a strong perception that the actual figure of the affected may be higher as the victims conceal their disease for fear of social backlash and stigma. The other target of the goals is to halt malaria and TB. To achieve this target, Bangladesh will have to halve the one million people actually affected by these diseases. The other targets are to reduce total fertility rate; which has to be brought down to 2.2 per cent by 2010, and to increase forest area for environmental harmony.

Anyway, speaking of the main goal is the poverty, its implied average annual rate of redaction is 3.3 per cent during 2000 to 2015. But the failure to achieve that rate during the past five years has caused the asking or required rate during 2005-2015 to go up significantly. The governments much-talked-about PRSP, based on the MDGs, which has piously called for halving poverty by 2015, means to focus its attention on job creation as the most important factor as that alone by and large will arrest soaring unemployment, which is at the root of poverty. However, PRSP also indicates a third target of reducing another measure of poverty, labelled extreme poverty (a measure of hunger to be considered).

It is now clear that depending on which poverty ratio with reference to which year, is used as the base, the poverty reduction rate with its benchmark varies between 3.3 per cent and 4.9 per cent per annum for the remaining years to 2015. Even the lowest is well beyond the past achievements in Bangladesh. Prospects of achieving such an acceleration in poverty reduction certainly look bleak as economic growth does not look like boosting due to resource and governance (with most corrupt epithet and inefficiency) constraints and because, to repeat, the distribution of the growth continues to be highly inequitable given the neoliberal freemarket dynamics and nothing on to reverse the trend and put in place an inclusive society. In fact, disparity bias been accentuating globally, between nations and within nations, around the world in the heels of freemarket fad and globalisation paradigm.

A joint review on MDG progress by UNESCAP, ADB and UNDP unfurls that no developing country in the region is on track to achieve all the goals by 2015. Furthermore, experts opined that Bangladesh would have to work hard to achieve the targets. It's progress to that end as of today is less than satisfactory, especially in income poverty, adult literacy, rate of immunisation et al. It is also indicated that Bangladesh faces as many as 26 challenges to achieve the MDGs in 2015. These included addressing income poverty, reaching the target groups, protection the vulnerable, designing and implementing effective polices, protecting women against discrimination and domestic violence, and reducing road accidents.

A research organisation in its Bangladesh Public Policy Watch found that at the present rate of steps being implemented, Bangladesh will require 135 year to remove poverty in rural areas and 43 years to achieve the prime target of the MDGs at the current rate of poverty alleviation. Given the high price of the main foods of the poor (coarse rice, fish, spices, vegetables, onions, salt, oil, etcetra), and other basic consumer essentials on one hand and extremely low incomes on the other, about a third or more of the population lives precariously and another 20 per cent struggles to make both ends meet. At the same time, poverty reduction rate is hopelessly low. Though the government of Bangladesh is hopeful of realising the best part of the goals by the stipulated time, official evidence shows that Bangladesh is off the track to eradicated poverty and achieve the MDG targets. The Citizen's Global Progress Report on Poverty Eradication ranked Bangladesh as the 5th worst among 125 countries in attaining the MDGs. It placed Bangladesh only next to Ethiopia, Rwanda, Niger, and Madagascar, the four worst counties.

The eight goals of the MDG represent a partnership between the developed and the developing countries, as the Millennium Declaration states. While leaving for the summit, M Saifur Rahman, the Finance Minister of the country, had told the press that the MDGs are not being implemented as the developed countries had not kept their promises to provide funds. However, the UN summit agreed to channel an additional fund of $ 50 billion a year by 2010 for fighting poverty as world leaders expressed their commitment to achieve the MDGs by the terminal year 2015. Notably, the rich countries had pledged at the Millennium Summit in 2000 to pay 0.7 per cent of their GNP as aid to help poor countries achieve the MDGs. Both these commitments will go a long way to meet the targets of the MDGs. But the rich nations, often talking through their hats, need to be good on their commitments.

Finally, this is to add that on the poverty front the target setting with reference to PPP US $1 is meaningless to the concerned people, to say the least. It is in reality irrelevant, even cruel proposition, and yet it seems clear that even the target so set will not to be achieved in Bangladesh and ten years ahead already matters look bleak. So, where do we stand and where the society may head is a million dollar (not a PPP one dollar) conundrum under the circumstances, which we may ignore but only to our great peril.

Source:Independent Bangladeshmore