That 11 people out of each 1,000 left cities and towns for villages in 2022 against only six in 2021 could be a piece of great news but for two reasons. The reverse migration was not by choice but out of compulsion. They left because they lost whatever employment they had and could not manage one for staying in urban centres. The other reason is no less concerning---26.4 people in 2022 against 18.4 of 1,000 in the previous year migrated to cities.
If this is not enough, the movement of 38.4 people in each 1,000 during the same period against 29.9 in 2021 from one municipality or metropolis to another would mark the desperation of poor and low-income people instead of their mobility by choice for better opportunities.
According to the Sample Vital Statistics of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), the per thousand rate of people who went abroad also increased from just 3.0 in 2021 to 6.6 in 2023. In 2020, there was a mass exodus of people who were mainly employed in the informal sector, many of them returned later. But no clear picture of this is available. In India, this rate of return home from cities and towns was 23 per cent. Bangladesh's share might have been lower than 20 per cent.
Increasing mobility of people means greater economic activities. Unfortunately, the movement of low-income people out of desperation does not correspond to this theory. During the Covid-19 lockdowns, the daily wage earners had no work as the majority of small factories and enterprises in the private sector had to close down and their employees were forced to leave cities and towns. Although, there is no lockdown now, economic hardship is no less biting and some of the small businesses or enterprises were forced to put their shutters down, rendering their employees without any source of income. These are the people who find no option other than returning to their ancestral homes.
The same is true of people who are moving from one city to another or to foreign lands in search of employment. Of course, a proportion of such people would have tried their luck abroad no matter if the financial stress and inflation were so pervasive or not. The fact is that employment opportunities have not expanded but over the past three years, the number of employable young people has accumulated to an astounding total. Inflation has made the situation worse because families can no longer wait for the long process of a decent job for their sons and daughters who were supposed to get employed by these three years and have helped with their incomes.
The job market in the country would have further expanded had the snowballing impacts of the Ukraine war not followed the pandemic. If the productive sector cannot become vibrant, opening for employment is impossible. Many of the large industries are suffering because they cannot open letters of credit (LCs) for import of raw materials and capital machinery. The smaller units are more at a disadvantage and hence they are mostly running under capacity. Moreover, production costs have also risen on account of soaring energy prices. Some factories had to shut down because they had no supply of natural gas used as the only fuel.
Business sharks have, made the matter worse by taking advantage of the crisis. They are manipulating the market in order to raise prices of essentials. This has fuelled inflation on the one hand, and caused more sufferings to the low-income people who are now looking for any livelihood option for survival. Even the middle class people find themselves in dire straits. If the situation continues, the natural consequence is stagflation ---one that will adversely affect all including the players responsible for market manipulation.
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