Dimension of poverty

• Early poverty dimension

• Negative image
– Bangladesh as test case of development,
– Landscape of disaster
– Catalogue of woe and
– Bottomless basket.
• positive idea
– Bangladesh represents an old civilization
– renewable resources
– better ecology
– hidden resilience 1
• What is poverty?
– WB definition: inability to attain a minimum
standard of living and an acceptable quality
of life.
– $1.90 a day is widely used as a poverty
indicator. Mortality, fertility, literacy rate
etc. are used as poverty indicators.
Positive changes:
1. Success in reducing population growth,
2. Reduction in mortality
3. Decline in child malnutrition
4. Reducing rural-urban gaps in human dev.
5. Modest pace of income-poverty reduction
6. Reduction in human poverty.
2
• Success in reducing population growth

– Total fertility rate 1975 6.3

1991 4.3
2007 2.4
2011 2.3
• Reason for success:
1. Favourable public policy
2. Low cost supply of FP services.
3. Awareness campaign of child bearing cost
4. Female education, labour force
participant.
5. Social and geographic diffusion.
3
• Impressive reduction in mortality.

– infant mortality 1985-89 105

2007 52.
2011 43
– under five mortality 1985/89 151
1995/99 94
2007 65
2011 53

– Life expectancy at birth 1990 55/56 Yrs

1999/00 61 Yrs
2011 69/70
– Rural urban gap in mortality declined from 5%
point to 2% points.
4
 – gender gap in mortality has come down (59 vs
58) but improvement was less for urban girls.
• Reason: Public health policy both preventive and
curative services,
• rapid expansion of child immunization from 1% in
1981 to 90 % in 1990.
• Collaborative work between Public agencies and
NGO.

• The problems: access of the poor to health

care services remains bleak. Children of the poor
class have higher (two times high) mortality than
the children of rich.
• Gap between geographically disadvantaged and
non disadvantaged exists.

5
3. Decline in child malnutrition
The rate of stunting at the national level
1985/86 69 %
1996 53 %
2007 43 %
2011 41 %
– Improvement in acute nutritional
deficiencies such as blindness.

• The problems ahead

– Low birth weight babies related with
mother’s nutritional status,
– Gender gap in nutritional status related
with cultural belief of son preference. 6
• 4. Reduce rural-urban gaps in human
development:
• Rural-urban gap reduced in no-income
indicators due to higher public allocation and
NGO program.
• But NGO program not enough required
public policy to address rural-urban gap.
• 5. Modest pace of income-poverty
reduction:
– Incidence of rural income poverty declined
from 53.4% 83-84 to 51.1 % in 95/96.

7
• Reduction in human poverty:
– Bangladesh shows fastest growing HDI
in the south East Asia.
– BD achieves improvement in basic and
elementary education.
• Examples: adult literacy rate, reduction in
gender bias education, school enrolment
rate. 
– Regional bias education existed, quality
education lacking.

Negative: Rising violence.

– violence against women has raised,
affect freedom and human rights.
– Rising social violence 8
 What can be done
• Programs that can reduce the difference within
poor include micro-credit, disaster-mitigation,
agricultural extension, and education and health
services.
• A number of welfare enhancing programs d for
the extreme poor like VGF,VGD, FFW, housing
for shelter less, grant for female destitute and
pension for the old are some of the initiatives.
• Despite all these initiatives, income poverty
reduction is slow because of slow economic
growth until 1990.
9
 Challenge of future growth:
• Income poverty and human poverty should
be deal separately. 
• Distribution of income and social opportunity
equitable.
• Investment in human capital like education,
health and nutrition and development of
rural non-farm sectors should be sought.

• Routes of poverty reduction at Macro level:

– macro stability,
– growth project,
 Improvement of governance
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______________________
MDG VS SDG
____________________

11
 What is the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development?
• At the Sustainable Development Summit on 25
September, 2015, UN Member States adopted the
2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, that
includes a set of 17 Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs).

• The SDGs based on MDGs (eight anti-poverty

targets) that the world committed to achieving by
2015. The MDGs, adopted in 2000, aimed at a
group of issues that included slashing poverty,
hunger, disease, gender inequality, and access
to water and sanitation. 12
 MDG VS SDG
_________________________________
• Enormous progress has been made through
MDGs and shows the value of a unifying
agenda. Despite this success, the indignity
of poverty has not been ended for all.
• 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
to
End poverty, fight inequality and
injustice, and tackle climate change by
2030.
13
• The United Nations Millennium
develop Goals Declaration, 2000.
_____________________________________
UN mission is to end extreme poverty by 2025.

1. Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger.

2. Achieve universal primary education.
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
4. Reduce child mortality.
5. Improve maternal health.
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases.
7. Ensure environmental sustainability.
8. Develop a global partnership for development.
14
 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
_____________________________________
1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere.
2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved
nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture.
3. Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all.
4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education
and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.
5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women
and girls.
6. Ensure access to water and sanitation for all.
7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable
and modern energy for all. 15
 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
_________________________________
8. Promote inclusive and sustainable economic
growth, employment and decent work for all.
9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote sustainable
industrialization and foster innovation.
10. Reduce inequality within and among countries.
11. Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and
sustainable.
12. Ensure sustainable consumption and production
patterns
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 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
__________________________________
13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and
its impacts
14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas
and marine resources 
15. Sustainably manage forests, combat
desertification, halt and reverse land degradation,
halt biodiversity loss.
16. Promote just, peaceful and inclusive societies
17. Revitalize the global partnership for sustainable
development.
17