Bangladesh has made tremendous progress by attaining the Millennium Development Goal (MDG)-1 of halving the extreme poverty by 2015, two years ahead of time. But still there are some special pockets where the people are lagging behind as they are marginalised due to their incapability of linking up with the market properly. These people live mostly in 'char' areas (land thrown up from rivers), 'haor' areas (low-lying drainage basins between two or more rivers), hills, urban and rural slums and on embankments.
There are about a million people who live on nearby embankments. They are mainly landless and resettled on such embankments illegally. If it is classified based on the geographical location, then they are the most vulnerable section of the extreme poor. They are the most marginalised people because of their location, as the embankments are built for protecting human settlements and their resources. So, literally there is no scope to establish any human settlements there. However, the paradox is that there are many resettlement projects there supported by the government. These areas are far from mainstream human niches. Therefore, they have no access to public facilities like markets, roads or any other connectivity with growth centres, development initiatives like schools, healthcare centres, common spaces or public places, societal institutions like community assembly centres, mosques, local government offices, banks and other government offices.
 Why do the extreme poor need to link up with the markets? Grossly we produce two types of products - services and commodities. We have to sell these products in a market. Therefore, it is essential to maintain good quality of the products for making them saleable in the market. The extreme poor, who reside in the geographically marginalised areas, lack the experience about how to be better prepared for the competition in a market. For sustainable economic growth, an equal market access is mandatory even in a liberal economy. So the extreme poor need to be equipped with good health, adequate skills, quality products and sound knowledge about the competitive market.    Â
The major factors influencing market linkages are classified as social, cultural and material. The material factors include road and connectivity, health and population service delivery, skills and basic education facility centres, growth centres and market places, financial institutions and favourable policies, laws and enforcement and other lifelines like industry, electricity or power supply. Some of the factors have been discussed below to have a better understanding of the issue.   Â
LOW-COST ROAD AND TRANSPORT CONNECTIVITY: A better and low-cost road and transport facility can help transport products of our landless farmers easily. If the transport cost is raised, then it will be difficult for the small farmers to transport their products to comparatively big markets, where they can sell those at better prices. Besides, they can return home after purchasing their essential goods at low prices. In that case they will gain in two ways - selling their products and buying their daily necessities from the similar class of producers.
HEALTH SUPPORT: Poor people are physically and technically lagging behind in investing their maximum potential, as they remain sick at least two days a week. They do not get any balanced diet. So they cannot work hard throughout the week. Whenever they work hard, they often remain sick for a long time. They do not come round immediately, as they cannot get proper medication.
BASIC EDUCATION: At present around 65 per cent of the population are literate. So, one-third of the population cannot read, write and count, though it is required in the everyday life. Our extreme poor people and their children also lack the knowledge about how to get access to information, emergency services etc. However, the mobile telephony has boomed in Bangladesh, irrespective of sex and class. But about 50 per cent adults, who are not literate, cannot read the text messages. Still both private and government agencies, with rare exception, send text messages instead of voice messages.
Dropout is a big challenge in our primary education. The dropout rate is high among the poor and extreme poor, though there are many social protection initiatives like primary stipend, no tuition fees and free books. Children from extreme poor families are mostly deprived of such noble initiatives as there are still some big hidden costs which they cannot bear. The costs include private tuition fees, the necessity of guide books and other unseen fees charged by the teachers on account of pencils and exercise books. If poor parents engage their children in jobs, then they can earn at least Tk 200 a week and around Tk 3,000 a month, apart from the free food. So this is a big drawback to sending children from extreme poor families to school. Â
SKILL-BASED EDUCATION: Different studies show that some skills about literacy and numeracy can make a big difference in a person's life. If somebody has the minimum literacy, then he can learn different livelihood-related skills at privately or state-run vocational and polytechnic institutions.
ACCESS TO FORMAL CREDIT MARKET: Our poor farmers, particularly extreme poor, have no access to micro-credit, let alone formal banking. So, when they plan to start a business or make any investment, they take credit from traditional money lenders, as this is still a traditional source of credit in rural areas as well as in urban slums The interest rate of such loans is 100 per cent to 300 per cent per year. So the costly loans left their investments more vulnerable in the community of small buyers, where the market is very fragile and it is difficult to get back the return.
CULTURAL AND SOCIAL FACTORS: Besides these material factors, there are some social and behavioural factors which are substantially important for ensuring the extreme poor's access to labour and product markets. They are generically the mental or cultural superstructure of the society, according to New Marxists Claude Levistraus, Miaisoux and Godellier. Gender disparity, religious belief like Pardha (seclusion) of women, support from relatives, begging and expecting some mental and material return through donating coins, lack of any social network or community organisations, some negative social dogmas like bringing up a girl child for marrying her off while parents depending on earnings of a girl and people who are engaged in labour-intensive jobs are looked down upon in the society. These are some factors that need to be addressed for ensuring the extreme poor's better access to market.
The writer is Coordinator, Research & Advocacy, Pathways From Poverty, a Shiree-DFID funded project, Practical Action, Bangladesh. ssssss.1969@gmail.com
MDG performance versus the extreme poor
Md. A. Halim Miah | Published: December 15, 2013 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00
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