The demographic structure has been changing rapidly not only in developed countries but also in developing countries. Like other developing countries, Bangladesh is passing the second stage of demographic transition where the population growth rate is higher than birth rate. Due to increase in per capita income, literacy rate, health facilities and consciousness about life and life expectancy also increase. Though the per capita income is double or higher compared to 1990s and 1980s respectively, income inequality still exists in the country. Due to its geographical location, Bangladesh is also a disaster-prone country. Every year many people are affected by natural disasters like flood, cyclone, storm, drought, land erosion and others. A large number of rural people, especially poor and elderly, are vulnerable. As a result, about 31.6 per cent people are poor and more than 17.5 per cent are hardcore poor.
The Social Safety Net (SSN) is widely used as an effective policy tool to help the vulnerable and extreme poor people in developed and developing countries. In Sub-Saharan countries, SSN programmes are very diverse. In South Africa, age-based transfer was an internal idea. After that South Africa, Mauritius, Namibia and other African countries introduced this programme as a non-contributory pension programme. This policy idea was extended in Europe and other parts of the world in 1950s. In 1990s, Zambia, Zimbabwe and other countries started vulnerability and poverty-based SSN programmes. But in 1980s the World Bank began to introduce SSN programmes in Latin American countries when they were suffering from most severe crises like dropping income and growth, increasing inflation and unemployment rate. During the financial crises in Asia, SSN programmes started using national and regional level to tackle the macroeconomic crises. In South Asian countries, assistance came from family and society after demographic and natural shocks. For example, private transfers for the 20 per cent people at the bottom were 13.56 per cent, 13.42 per cent and 17.6 per cent in 2008 in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh respectively. Now it has become a national, regional as well as international issue. Due to environmental degradation and geographical position, this region is more vulnerable to natural shocks. From 1990 to 2007, about 682 natural disasters were recorded in this area and about 0.4 million people were killed. In terms of the number of incidents, Bangladesh was the worst-affected country.
Bangladesh is the most populated and vulnerable South Asian country. After independence in 1971, the country started its journey with a large number of vulnerable and extreme poor people. Realising this fact, the government introduced the SSN programmes like Vulnerable Group Feeding (VGF) for extreme poor households. For the first time, Bangladesh was affected by a famine in 1974. Gratuitous and Test Relief programmes were launched for the affected people. Like other developing countries, the demographic structure of Bangladesh started changing rapidly in 1990s. Old age allowance has come as a policy tool based on the principle of protection. After that, multiple programmes have come out for protection and promotion.
The demographic structure is changing rapidly around the world - even in Bangladesh. The recent trend shows that the number of elderly people and those belonging to the age group of 14-64 are increasing, but the number of people in the under-14 age group is decreasing rapidly. In 1990 the under-14 age group, 14-64 age group and the 65+ age group accounted for 44.4, 52.6 and 3.0 per cent. In 2012 these rates increased to 33.6, 61.6 and 4.8 per cent respectively. It is projected that these rates will increase to 24.4, 67.6 and 8.0 per cent respectively. Among the total population, the ratio of women to people is increasing day by day due to the decrease in infant mortality and maternal mortality rate (United Nations, 2003). In the age group of 14-64 years, about 50.7 per cent were women and the sex ratio was 109.8 percent in 1981. Due to an increase in the number and life expectancy of this group of people, the ratio of women increased to 55.5, 57.9, 59.8 and 62 per cent in 1995, 2000, 2005 and 2010 respectively. It is forecast that it will be 67.7 per cent of the total population in 2030 (International Data Base, 2012).
On the other hand, the age group of 65+, both male and female, accounted for 3.0 per cent of the total population in 1982. It increased to 3.3 per cent, 3.6 per cent, 4.1 per cent and 4.6 per cent in 1995, 2000, 2005 and 2010 respectively. But the ratio of women is increasing more rapidly compared to men. The male-to-female ratio was 123.4 per cent in 1981 in the age group of 65+. It fell to 111.9, 103.5, 98.6 and 95.6 per cent in 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2010 respectively. It is projected that this ratio will fall to 88.5 per cent in 2030. This means the number of women among the elderly people is also increasing gradually. The number of people aged between 14 and 64 is also increasing rapidly. This group of people is treated active and called the labour force of the country. However, most of them will be employed in the informal sector or remain unemployed or underemployed due to shortage of employment opportunities in the formal sector.
MODELS OF SOCIAL SAFETY NETS IN BANGLADESH: The SSN programme refers to the non-contributory financial help for vulnerable, extreme poor or targeted group of people. SSN programmes are meant for assisting those enduring economic sufferings and giving assistance to the poor. This term is also applied to a set of social programmes that are totally focused on less-advantaged and more vulnerable people. SSN programmes are designed to serve the people with money, education or treatment facilities.
In Bangladesh, there were two types of public SSN programmes, namely food rationing and post-disaster relief programmes. On the other hand, informal SSN programmes at family and community levels were devised to tackle demographic and social shocks.
Food rationing and post-disaster relief were introduced after independence in 1971. After the famine of 1974, the first change took place in the programmes and the Food for Work (FFW) was introduced. At the same time, the Vulnerable Group Feeding (VGF) programme was launched targeting poor women in 1975. At the end of 1980s, the subsequent turning point was urban and rural rationing as an anti-poverty programme. Two new programmes then were introduced based on food to utilise women's labour: one was Rural Infrastructure Maintenance Programme, and another was Social Forestry. In addition, in the 1990s, two innovative SSN programmes were unlocked. The first one was conditional cash transfer (CCT) focusing on girls' education for a new goal of human development and social empowerment of women. The second one was extension of the allowance programme to cover the elderly and destitute women such as widows and deserted women.
In 1990s another big development was institutionalisation of the post-disaster food security programme for long-term support. After the 1998 flood, the Vulnerable Group Feeding (VGF) programme emerged as a new SSN programme. The present decade has seen a multi-dimensional evaluation of SSN programmes. Some multi-component programmes are Primary Education Stipend Project (PESP), National Nutrition Programme (NUP), Rural Employment Opportunities for Public Assets (REOPA) and Employment Guarantee Programme for Poorest (EGPP).
The government is firmly committed to mitigate miseries of the hard-core poor and the destitute community. Therefore, the government allocates more resources every year from its non-development budget to implement a number of SSN programmes. The programmes can be classified on the basis of age groups such as elderly people for protection, young people for protection and promotion, and children for human resource development and poverty reduction in the long-run. SSN programmes of Bangladesh give special consideration to the vulnerable groups among the poor. These groups include elderly poor people, widowed or deserted women, disabled persons, assistance for acid-burnt people, assistance for lactating mothers, etc.
The writer, holding PhD, is a faculty of the Department of Economics at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST) in Sylhet.
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