Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday declared another 12 districts and 123 upazilas free of homeless and landless people as 22,101 more families were provided with homes under the Ashrayan-2 project. Earlier, the PM declared nine districts as landless and homeless people-free districts on two occasions. It is worth mentioning that the premier has so far given houses to a total of 8,29,607 families under Ashrayan projects and other programmes.
In order to become a developing country we must step up more efforts to tackle poverty and homelessness prudently and strategically. Bangladesh's efforts to eradicate poverty are now very well recognised and admired throughout the world. In view of enviable success in various socio-economic indicators in the last decade under the pragmatic leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh has now become a middle-income country. The incumbent government has successfully reduced the country’s poverty rate by 50 percent in the last ten years. However, the country has set an ambitious target to alleviate extreme poverty to 2.3 percent by 2031 and moderate poverty to below 3 percent by 2041. In order to chase this target within the stipulated time, necessary initiatives should be taken to address some key issues such as climate change, natural disasters and weak rural infrastructure which have long been deterring our efforts towards eradicating poverty.
The government must take
initiatives for enhancing
poor people's participation
in economic activities
There is no denying that the government is providing allowance for the poor and needy. But apart from giving allowance, it has become more of a necessity to involve the poor in income-generating works.
Though we have achieved enviable success in poverty alleviation, the rate of poverty reduction is not adequate compared to the country’s striking growth rate. Also, the rich-poor divide has been growing remarkably in Bangladesh.
Hence, the government should give more priority to inclusive and micro-level development than economic growth. In order to make our economic growth more inclusive, the government must take initiatives for enhancing poor people's participation in economic activities.
