Accelerating economic growth to alleviate poverty

Poverty is still the main hindrance to the economic development of Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and developing countries in the world and alleviation of poverty is the big challenge to these countries for economic emancipation. Although about 940 million people have got relief from ultra poverty all over the world in the last three decades, still more than 1,000 million people are ultra poor. About 25% poverty-stricken people still live in Bangladesh and the country has taken it as a challenge to address this as it is the premier hurdle towards fulfilling basic five needs for each and every citizen.
The government of Bangladesh is setting a vision of making the country a middle-income one in the next few years. Regarding the vision to achieve, the government is chalking out plans in the monetary sector. As a result of taking visionary economic plans and monetary reforms, the government has been able to increase per capita income and other financial performance indicators as well as to reduce poverty rate. But according to the UN, Bangladesh is still an LDC and there are 48 LDC countries in the world. Because of existence of poverty in the country, Bangladesh is still on the list of LDCs of the UN. So, eradication of poverty is the prime issue to be addressed for economic emancipation of the country although the country has reduced poverty rate from 48.9% in 2000 to 25.6% in 2014. At present the rate of ultra poverty in the country is 12.4%.
Therefore both the rates of poverty and ultra poverty are still challenging on the way to making the country a middle-income one. Good governance, transparency and accountability are key components for alleviating poverty. Poverty is often a result of poor government policies. Corruption and poor management of the economy is also a major factor in promoting poverty. To eradicate poverty from its roots there is need to fight against corruption, improve governance and ensure transparent use of funds. The symptoms and indicators of development of Bangladesh are quite visible to the nation as well as to the international community. The country is going to construct the historical, gigantic and the most expensive Padma Bridge without taking any monetary support from outside. The country is exporting rice now a day. At present the growth rate of the country is six per cent. Mortality rates of children and pregnant mothers have dropped significantly in the last few years. Infant death rate is 47 deaths/1000 live births. Maternal death rate is 240 deaths/100,000 live births. Enrolment rate in primary education is nearly hundred per cent and drop-out rate in primary cycle is below 25%. Construction and reconstruction of roads, bridges, culverts, flyovers etc are remarkably being executed all over the country in full swing. Educational institutions are getting privileges for its construction of school building, new classroom, toilet, tube well etc and appointment of new teachers and staff, supply of free books up to secondary level, providing stipend to students, arranging frequent training for teachers, introducing IT-based multi-media classroom teaching etc. The government is spending huge amount of money from its revenue budget for strengthening Social Security Network through providing allowances for freedom fighters, widows, old people, pregnant women, disabled people etc. People are getting free medical consultancy, diagnostic and medicine facilities and food facilities from government hospitals, medical colleges and health complexes. No other country in the world can ever claim of providing these sorts of free but cost-effective services for its people.
Without strengthening economic growth and developing financial performance indicators, no nation can achieve rapid and significant development in the said areas. So, Bangladesh can proudly claim for its successive economic development in the last few years that happened due to combined efforts of hard working people and development-friendly government. There are a huge number of laborious human resources, fertile lands for cultivation throughout the year, precious natural resources, comfortable climate for working hard in industrial and agricultural sectors and God-gifted beautiful places for developing tourism in the country. Despite having these strengths, the country is not developing economically so rapidly and steadily like other developed countries in the world because of absence of good governance, transparency and accountability in the government administrative machinery. Increased rate of economic growth is directly related to poverty alleviation. The country's growth rate is six per cent and it could be around eight per cent or more if the government can ensure good governance and remove corruption.
Besides improvement in agricultural sector growth, government should take necessary measures for improvement of growth in other sectors of economy. Government should show zero tolerance in ensuring highest level of qualitative development works executed by the offices like LGED, RHD, PDB, DESA, PWD, city corporations, municipalities, zila parishads, union parishads etc. Good governance and accountability should be ensured in public offices especially in the hospitals and educational institutions. One stop and IT-based services might be introduced in the public offices to keep service providers away from service receivers for dispelling corruption. Government should take rapid punitive actions against public and private officials for misusing government money and resources. Agro-based industrialisation should give more privileges as the country has affluent raw materials and knowledgeable labour force.
But industrialisation in the cultivable lands must be prohibited. Free one-stop services for gas, electricity, land acquisition, permission etc to domestic and foreign investors should be ensured. Government needs to bring all the eligible persons under income tax payment according to their actual annual income and also needs to strengthen monitoring system for generating actual revenues from VAT with the help of tax department officials. Initiatives should be taken to beautify the tourist spots, ensure full security and remove all hindrances to make Bangladesh a paradise of tourists.
Last but not the least the country badly needs to maintain political stability to encourage foreign investors to invest lavishly but confidently to accelerate economic growth. This will happen only if the country can restore harmony among political parties as well as stop strikes (hartals) and political agitation marked with vandalism and rampage of public and private property. The country must develop economically to a great extent to alleviate poverty. The day is not so far away from today when the country will be able to root out poverty.

The writer is working for primary education in Bangladesh.
auparbayazidkhan@gmail.com