The road map for Bangladesh to take

Kazi Lutfur Rahman

Bangladesh is at a critical juncture and facing a difficult and challenging time ahead. Its challenges of development agenda are, indeed, immense. However, in the quest for quick economic growth and development, the country must seek inclusive economic growth. It has to put in more resources for reduction of poverty of millions of people who live under desperate poverty. This would need to create and expand access to opportunities and more investment in health, education and safety net programmes for the poorest. Alongside, the country needs big investment in infrastructures -- energy, power generation, roads, railway and ports -- to attract further investment and ensure industrial development and employment creation through private sector participation

Bangladesh's aspiration to become a middle income country by 2020 must be led by the private sector. A robust private sector is the key to attracting investment, entrepreneurship and technological innovation needed for quick economic growth. Without private sector investment, jobs and economic opportunities for the thousands of people can hardly be ensured. In this backdrop, the government needs to continuously invest in infrastructures and social development, and to further liberalize the policies and regulations and remove obstacles to inclusive growth and private sector driven development efforts.

Bangladesh can gain a lot from regional and sub-regional integration and cooperation. Economic and social cooperation through forums like SAARC and BIMSTEC can help it not only to accelerate its economic development through promoting regional trade and investment, but would also protect its people from cross-border environmental and health risks. In this context, there is the need for upgrading and opening the Chittagong Port for the use of eastern Indian states and other landlocked neighbouring countries and developing it as a regional hub. This could be a major driver for the country's economic development.

Some governance reforms were earlier initiated by the caretaker government. Unfortunately, one major reform that has remained untouched is the sluggish and complex bureaucratic structure of the government. This is the mother of all other reforms. The pyramid bureaucratic structure and its archaic systems and procedures, inherited from the colonial days, are characterized by inefficiency, centralization, lack of delegation and job description; too many tiers in the decision making process; archaic filing and noting system and lack of e-governance; and poor pay structure are out of place in the modern states. That is why it is incapable of implementing government's own development projects, let alone promoting business and investment. This requirement needs to be highlighted so that the incumbent government takes steps at the earliest for transforming this bureaucracy. Without its reforms, implementation target of development projects will always fall short and the vision of transforming Bangladesh into a middle-income country by 2020 may remain as an illusion.

The world is transforming fast. The stock and quality of human resources has become a key to accelerating growth and reducing poverty. Bangladesh has made considerable progress in establishing a comprehensive education system, particularly in providing access to primary education. Its quality of education, however, needs improvement at all levels. Even though there are pockets of excellence, the overall quality of higher education remains a concern due to a lack of funds, shortage of qualified teachers, weak management and supervision, and in certain cases, politicization of campuses. In many universities, access to ICT, science laboratories, and other educational facilities is limited. Education that is provided is not strongly linked to market demands. There is also inadequate focus on science and technology or on areas that produce marketable skills.

Over 80% of young graduates enroll in general studies; only 20% study science, technology, and applied subjects. Any nation that does not possess the ability and the technology to gain and process vast amounts of information quickly will lag behind in development. Much instructional time is lost due to demonstrations and strikes, particularly at public universities. As a result, degrees are not awarded in time. This adversely affects the academic and career pursuits of the students. It is a genuine concern that campus violence has now extended to some private universities. Bangladesh can easily double or even triple the foreign exchange remittance from expatriate workers by investing and focusing a little more on technical and science education, human resource development and language training. The country needs more skilled technicians, data entry clerks, professional managers, accountants, computer programmers, IT consultants, bio-technicians, architects, designers and corporate lawyers than generalist graduates in literature and social sciences. In a world where knowledge is not only power, but also for sale, and where almost every large company that relies upon remote transactions is starting to hire more cost-effective labor overseas, the stock and quality of human resources has become a key for less developed countries like Bangladesh. This is of utmost importance in order to participate in the global growth process, and to reduce poverty and attain a better quality of life.

Bangladesh's development challenges are critical and manifolds. To tackle the challenges that the country faces, it needs capable and mature political leadership, pro-poor economic agenda, business friendly policies, efficient but smaller bureaucracy, decentralization, strong local governments and opportunities for participation of the poorest. The country also needs to invest more for human resource and skill development so that it can rise to the challenges of a competitive and globalized world.