Almost three years have passed since the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) implementation period was initiated from January 01, 2016. Data for only two years are available for 70 out of 232 indicators, set by the United Nations (UN), making it difficult to conduct a full assessment of the progress made by the country based on targets.
In the past, Bangladesh was widely acclaimed as one of the forerunners of the implementation of Millennium Development Goals (MDG). The MDGs had eight goals, 21 targets and 60 indicators. The country made outstanding progress in the areas of poverty alleviation, ensuring food security, increasing primary school enrolment, gender parity in primary and secondary level education, lowering infant and under-five mortality rate and maternal mortality ratio, improving immunisation coverage, and reducing the incidence of communicable diseases. Many targets were achieved ahead of time while others were achieved within the 2015 deadline. Out of 21 targets, three could not be achieved.
As a result, Bangladesh was an active participant in the global process leading to the preparation of the post-2015 Development Agenda. Bangladesh's proposals to the UN were strikingly similar to the proposals made by the Open Working Group (OWG) of the United Nations. Nine out of 11 goals were similar. Other goals proposed by OWG were also included in Bangladesh's proposal, but as targets of different goals.
The starting time of the Sustainable Development Goals (2016-2030) and the 7th Five Year Plan (FYP) for (2016-2020) was a mere coincidence. Still it provided the country with an opportunity to integrate SDGs in the 7th FYP. As a result, Bangladesh had an early start in the implementation of SDGs. All the 17 goals were integrated into the plan - 14 goals (82 per cent) of the 7th FYP are thematically fully aligned with three goals (Goal 12, Goal 16 and Goal 17) of the SDGs. The remaining 18 per cent are partially aligned with the 7th FYP. Thus fulfilling the 7th FYP objectives and targets will largely contribute towards achievement of SDGs.
The Bangladesh government has been following the "whole of society" approach in the implementation of SDGs by involving various stakeholders.
Several important documents, in quick succession, were prepared by General Economics Division (GED) of the Planning Commission to identify the ministries and agencies responsible for SDGs implementation and to guide them in their actions. These include mapping of ministries by sustainable development goals and targets, preparation of ministry/division's action plan to achieve SDGs, data gap analysis for SDGs, monitoring and evaluation framework of SDGs, SDGs needs assessment and financing strategy and education sector strategy for attaining Goal 4.
It is imperative to evaluate the progress during the first two years of SDGs implementation (2016-2017). Primarily, such an exercise, given the availability of data, will shed light on where the economy is on track and the areas where it is lagging behind other economies. Secondly, it will reveal the data gap that needs to be filled. Otherwise, success cannot be numerically measured and demonstrated. Thirdly, it will prompt the government to rethink policies, strategies and actions to help achieve the targets. Fourth, the government may need to resort to qualitative assessment of some of the targets where data is not available and also in case of metadata (methodology not defined yet).
Following are brief accounts of where Bangladesh stands on the progress of SDGs over the past two years and where it can go in the remaining 13 years.
GOAL 1-END POVERTY: The nation is on track to reduce extreme poverty measured by $ 1.90 per day or by national poverty line (NPL). Similarly, progress on expanding coverage of social protection and proportion of government expenditure on services (health, education and social protection) as a share of total government expenditure are also on track. In fact, share of education expenditure may overshoot the target. Progress on reducing incidence of poverty does not seem to be on track at the current rate of reduction. However, with higher growth in the economy, it is possible to achieve the milestone, provided increase in inequality can be restrained.
GOAL 2-END HUNGER: Progresses on stunting and wasting appear to be on track at the current rate of reduction. Agriculture Orientation Index (AOI) with a value exceeding 0.50 compares favourably with those of India (0.40), Nepal (0.20) and Sri Lanka. Total official flows to agriculture sector are low mainly because of changing donor preferences in aid allocation. A change in development partner preferences is required in view of emphasis on SDGs on international support to agriculture in order to enhance aid flows to Bangladesh.
GOAL 3-HEALTHY LIVES AND WELL-BEING: Child-related indicators, namely, under-5 mortality rate (U5MR) (31 per 1,000 live births, SVRS 2017) and neo-natal mortality rate (NMR) (17 per 1,000 live births, SVRS 2017) have already crossed the 2020 milestone targets (U5MR-34 and NMR-17), ahead of time. Past pace of progress implies that women-related indicators like maternal mortality ratio (MMR), number of medically-trained care providers during child birth, proportion of currently married women who use modern contraceptive method, and adolescents (women aged 15-19 years) are very close to reaching their targets in 2020. Steps have been taken with due attention to reach the 2020 target of health worker density per 10,000 population. The number of births attended by skilled health personnel has increased from 9.50 per cent in 1994 to over 42.10 per cent in 2014 and further to 53 per cent in 2017 (BDHS 2017). The proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel is targeted to increase to 65 per cent by 2020 indicating that the progress will be on track.
Recruitment of a significant number of healthcare personnel including doctors, nurses, midwives, family welfare visitors and family welfare assistants, were completed. These recruitment processes are contributing to materialise the progress of health-related status. A large number of family planning (FP) outreach workers are also going to be recruited soon. Moreover, a large number of health facilities have been constructed/ renovated to ensure better health services for the people.
GOAL 4-INCLUSIVE AND EQUITABLE QUALITY EDUCATION: Gender Parity Index (GPI) exceeded 1.0 at primary and secondary levels of education. The GPI has remained above 1 (with annual fluctuations) for more than a decade displaying its highest ranking in South Asia. GPI at tertiary education reached its peak at 0.737 in 2014 and then declined to 0.701 in 2016. Concerted efforts are needed to reverse the direction of change of tertiary GPI. The proportion of primary school teachers with DPAD/C-in-Ed degree has been rising. It was more than 80 per cent of total teachers in 2015. It is heartening to note that the rates in 2018 have already exceeded those set for the milestone in 2020 by a wide margin along with convergence of gender differentiated rates.
The Gross Enrolment Ratio in pre-primary education has been increasing at a slow pace of 1.45 percentage points per annum since 2013. With this pace of progress, the milestone set for 2020 cannot be achieved. Heightened efforts are needed to make headway in pre-primary education in recognition of its importance.
GOAL 5-GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN EMPOWERMENT: Women and girls aged 15 years and above are subjected to different types of violence by their current or former intimate partners as well as by persons who are not their partners. Pitiably, they are significantly more at risk with their intimate partners. Women bear significantly greater burden of unpaid domestic and care work - more than a quarter of their daily time in the family than men. Earlier, women used to bear significantly greater burden of unpaid domestic and care work - more than a quarter of their daily time, in the family than men. There has been encouraging changes in this respect.
The 2020 milestone (25 per cent for women and 6 per cent for men) has already been achieved (female 23.6 per cent and male 6.9 per cent) ahead of time. The proportion of female members in Parliament has been increasing over time reaching about 21 per cent.
GOAL 6-CLEAN WATER AND SANITATION: The success of Bangladesh in achieving MDG targets is well recognised. As part of this recognition, Prime Minister of Bangladesh was made a member of High-Level Panel on Water (HLPW) for SDG 6. This membership induced a lot of activities in SDG 6 and an action plan was formulated by the water resources ministry (MoWR). Currently, 87 per cent population has access to safe water sources (Target 6.1) and 61 per cent population has access to safe sanitation (Target 6.2). The target of 100 per cent by 2030 is very much achievable given the country's track record in achieving MDG targets. For sustainable management of water resources, two key initiatives can be observed related to Target 6.3 (improvement of water quality) and Target 6.6 (protection of water ecosystem). Hazaribagh tannery industries were relocated to Savar in order to improve the severely degraded water quality of the Buriganga. To preserve Halda river ecosystem, drastic steps were taken this year bearing immediate results in terms of collection of fish eggs.
GOAL 7- AFFORDABLE, RELIABLE, SUSTAINABLE AND MODERN ENERGY: It is heartening to note that Bangladesh is fast progressing towards ensuring access of all to electricity well ahead of the deadline of 2025, provided that things proceed on the current path. In 2018, nationally 90 per cent population have access to electricity. The country lags behind in other targets related to primary reliance on clean fuels and technology and share of renewable energy in the total final energy consumption. Energy efficiency appears to be improving.
GOAL 8-SUSTAINED, INCLUSIVE AND SUSTAINABLE ECONOMIC GROWTH AND DECENT WORK: Bangladesh appears to have made an upward shift in the average annual growth rate of 6-7 per cent to more than 7 per cent over the last three years (FY2015 till FY2018). This coupled with slower population growth led to increasing GDP growth per person. The country is nearly on track to achieve the 2020 target.
It also should be noted that the average annual growth rate of GDP per employed person has already reached the 2020 target in FY2017. The estimated unemployment rate in Bangladesh has been closer to 4.0 per cent for a long time. It can be reasonably expected that it will remain closer to this figure in the near future.
There is no official data on child labour after 2013. It can be expected that with stronger growth and elimination of extreme poverty as well as greater access to education, child labour situation will significantly improve in the future. There has been sustainable improvement in financial inclusion, which is further contributing to growth and poverty reduction.
Some aspects of the labour market are currently not on track. If the recent erosion in real wages persists, the targeted 20 per cent increase in real wage by 2020 may not be achieved. Also, increasing informality, which undermines government efforts to ensure decent jobs and higher employment rate of women and persons aged 15-29 years, need to be addressed to achieve the 2020 targets.
There were about 29 per cent of youth who were 'not in education, employment and training (NEET)' in the base year. This number increased to about 30 per cent in the following year.
While the proportion of young males NEET was closer to 10 per cent, the proportion of NEET young females was closer to 50 per cent in FY2017. Both rates are higher than the levels attained in the preceding year which puts them off-track. All out efforts should be made for creation of jobs while keeping the political economy stable.
GOAL 9-RESILIENT INFRASTRUCTURE, SUSTAINABLE INDUSTRIALISATION AND INNOVATION: The contribution of manufacturing value to GDP has been increasing. By 2017, the indicator already exceeded the 2020 milestone. Similarly, manufacturing value added per worker has been rising. But without a target set for 2020, no comment can be made on achieving the target. The share of manufacturing employment in total employment increased to 2013 and then levelled off in the last two years. Whether this is the beginning of a long term phenomenon, whereby rising value added share will be associated with falling employment share, can be evaluated later.
Total international support to infrastructure has been on the rise with some annual fluctuations. With continuous growth, the target for 2020 will be met. The proportion of population covered by mobile network has reached close to 100 per cent in case of 2G technology. In case of 3G technology, the 2020 milestone was achieved in 2017.
GOAL 10-REDUCED INEQUALITIES: The government has been following a pro-poor development strategy that combines promotion of economic growth and reduction of poverty and inequality. While the policies were largely effective at enhancing growth and reducing poverty, they did not succeed at reversing the worsening income distribution. According to recent available data (HIES 2016), income inequality has increased while consumption inequality has remained relatively stable.
There were some developments with regard to reducing inter-country income inequality. Bangladesh has approved Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Policy 2016 in January, 2016 with a view to ensuring and encouraging safe migration and protection of migrants and their families. The proportion of tariff lines applied to imports from least developed countries with zero tariffs remains the same as the Doha Round of WTO negotiations-formally, the Doha Development Agenda-launched in 2001.
Official development assistance has been enjoying an increasing trend that has continued in the SDG period. The average annual flow increased to US $6,250 million in 2018 which has surpassed the 2020 milestone.
Foreign direct investment shows an increasing trend with annual fluctuation reaching US$ 2,453.8 million in 2017. With recent average annual increase in foreign direct investment (FDI), the 2020 milestone of US$12 billion will be hard to achieve.
GOAL 11-SUSTAINABLE CITIES AND COMMUNITIES: Bangladesh has a low level of urbanisation with an estimated 35 per cent of the population living in urban areas in 2016. In terms of absolute population, this urban population of 56.28 million is still quite large. The level of urbanisation in the country ranges from 7.20 per cent in Satkhira district to more than 90 per cent in Dhaka district.
Lack of adequate housing is a key problem in all the cities and secondary towns in Bangladesh. This has manifested in housing deficit of 4.60 million units in 2010. Nearly 44 per cent of the urban population once lived in purely temporary structures and 29 per cent lived in semi-permanent structures. Thus there has been significant improvement in the quality of housing in recent years as evident from Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) 2016. Nearly 96 per cent of families in slums live in poor quality (not pucca) houses.
Phenomenal growth in the demand for transportation services are leading to the increase in motorised and non-motorised vehicles. This is causing extreme traffic congestion. In Dhaka, traffic congestion creates a loss of estimated 5 million work hours a day.
According to HIES 2016, 37.28 per cent urban households have access to piped water with wide variation across urban centres. The highest coverage occurs in mega city Dhaka where Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority meets 90 per cent of requirements in its service area. In almost all the other urban centres, there are no sewers and a large number of households lack connection to septic tanks (Ahmed 2017). There has been, however, significant improvement in the use of sanitary toilets from 32.40 per cent in 1981 to 76.80 per cent in 2017 (BBS, 2017).
Many of the cities in Bangladesh are vulnerable to various natural disasters such as river erosion, cyclones, droughts, tornadoes, cold waves, floods, flash floods and earthquakes as well as human induced disasters such as fire and building collapse. Bangladesh has made significant efforts to reduce its disaster vulnerability and is considered today a global leader in coastal resilience due to its significant long term investments in protecting lives.
Despite these efforts, the vulnerability of the coastal population is on the rise due to climate change. According to Earthquake Disaster Risk Index of Stanford University, from a global perspective, Dhaka is one of the most vulnerable cities to earthquake.
GOAL 12-SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION PATTERNS: Food loss and waste is a matter of grave concern globally. It is more important in developing countries like Bangladesh where millions of people still go hungry (resulting in stunting, underweight and wasting). An estimated 10 per cent of crop productivity in Bangladesh is lost during post-harvest operations.
Generation and management of solid waste in urban areas are also key concerns. The total solid waste generation in all urban centres in Bangladesh in 2005 stood at 13,332.9 tons per day. From this, Dhaka and Chattogram accounted for 34.80 per cent and 11.60 per cent of total waste respectively. Waste management system in Bangladesh comprising formal, community initiative and informal system is still not well organised. A small proportion of solid waste is recycled into compost. The amount of GHG emission from urban solid waste was estimated at 2.19 million CO2 emissions per year in 2005.
GOAL 13-CLIMATE ACTION: The number of deaths, missing persons and directly affected persons attributed to disasters per 100,000 population (Indicator 13.1.1) have fallen significantly over the years. Now it stands at 12,881 with a target of 6,500 by 2020 and 1,500 by 2030. Given Bangladesh's track record in disaster management, this target will not be difficult to achieve. Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief (MoDMR) has prepared the Disaster Risk Reduction Strategies of Bangladesh (2016-2020) in line with the Sendai Framework, which will be helpful in this regard.
In facing climate change scenarios, Bangladesh is well prepared with a number of climate change related strategies, plans and actions. Through Bangladesh Climate Change Trust Fund (BCCTF), the country has spent around Tk. 27 billion over last eight years for climate change adaptation.
GOAL 14-LIFE BELOW WATER: Bangladesh has recently gained a vast swath of marine territory. This marine area is rich in natural gas resources and biodiversity. Exploitation of gas resources may pose grave danger to biological resources. Sustainable management of these resources is now a big challenge for the country. In recent times, it has declared two marine protected areas, one targeting Hilsa breeding ground and Cetaceans. The total protected marine area now stands at 2.05 per cent from the total marine area (Target 14.5). Major success has been achieved in Hilsa protection with production almost doubling in last 15 years.
GOAL 15-LIFE ON LAND: Forest coverage of the country now stands at 17.50 per cent. There is a target to increase this number to 20 per cent by 2020.
Also, the quality of the forest in terms of canopy coverage is becoming a major concern. Increasing tree density is therefore a major target under 7th FYP.
In order to protect its very rich bio-diversity, the country has taken many steps including continuing moratorium on tree felling, declaring Environment Conservation Act, creating special bio-diversity zones and creating two vulture safe zones.
GOAL 16-PEACE, JUSTICE AND STRONG INSTITUTIONS: The number of victims of intentional homicide has declined significantly from its baseline value. Appropriate measures undertaken by the government of Bangladesh contributed significantly to improving human trafficking and youth mental and physical abuse. Improvement has also taken place in other vital areas.
Incidence of sexual violence experienced by females has also met the SDG target. If the current average performance continues, majority of the SDG targets of Goal 16 will be achieved ahead of the estimated time frame.
GOAL 17-GLOBAL PARTNERSHIP FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: Most of the indicators, for which data is available, suggest that Bangladesh achieved remarkable progress during the SDGs implementation period and are on track to reach the 2020 Milestone of SDGs. Government revenue as proportion of GDP has increased more than the estimated required rate mainly due to the measures undertaken to increase the number of tax payers. However, tax collection and management mechanism cannot seemingly keep up with the pace of GDP increase. Data on ODA indicate modest growth though its contribution to the national budget fell marginally in recent years. Inflow of FDI and remittance requires substantial increase to reach the target.
Other indicators such as access to internet, and use of internet communication facilities by individuals have improved significantly in recent years. Expansion of fibre optics cable network, increase in optical fibre capacity etc have been contributing towards achieving the SDG target. If the current average annual performance rate continues in the following years, targets for 2030 will be achieved quite easily in almost all the cases.
WAY FORWARD: All the indicators for which data are available reveal improvement in the SDGs period except some like the Gender Parity Index at tertiary level education. In other cases the rate of progress varies among indicators. The implementing ministries and their agencies will need to assess their respective status and fix their future work plans accordingly to achieve the SDGs.
In fact, these findings are a source of encouragement for new actions towards achieving the SDGs within the deadline or well ahead of the deadline as was the case with MDGs. In this context, the performance assessment of progress in SDGs implementation by UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network needs to be mentioned. Incidentally, the report found Bangladesh lagging in several areas resulting in "red" threshold on 10 out of 17 SDGs. Experience from preparing the first assessment report indicates that the UN report was carried out with very limited data and in many cases the lack of assessment of relevant indicators did not show any meaningful progress. While limitation of data still persists, an improved situation can be visualised from this paper.
Professor Shamsul Alam is Member (Senior Secretary), General Economics Division, Bangladesh Planning Commission.
© 2024 - All Rights with The Financial Express
