Dhaka, Bangladesh: The time has come to celebrate the huge contributions of volunteers across the world. It is a day for groups, organizations, communities and countries to recognize individuals that volunteer their time and the contributions that volunteers make in the society. It is a day dedicated to generating awareness and interest in volunteers who work towards making life better for others and to inspire others to get involved to do their parts to make the world a safer and healthier place.
In Bangladesh this year our theme is 'Volunteers Against Poverty' (VAP). The choice of this theme is as a result of the hydra-headed impacts of poverty in every aspect of lives both in Bangladesh and beyond. The eradication of poverty is central to the elimination of diseases, gender equality, universal education, reduction of infants and maternal mortality due to increased affordability, fight against HIV/AIDS, malaria etc.
Along the same lines, millions of volunteers are involved in different poverty related programmes and projects and have made numerous contributions in this area.
Hence, IVD 2008 is aimed at mobilizing and engaging in activities towards the eradication of poverty. Organizations are encouraged to carry out activities towards the eradication of poverty. Volunteers must stand up and voice their commitment to the fight against poverty.
On the other hand, volunteers need to voice and commit to this fight in an enabling environment; an environment that has the political will and the policy tools for effective volunteer service delivery and impact.
So as we as volunteers fight against poverty, we also need to register the need for adequate policies to promote volunteerism. We also intend to use the event to launch the 2009 advocacy campaign for the recognition of volunteerism.
In the light of the above, the activities for this year include:
- Press Release on various activities by organizations to mark IVD 2008.
- Signature Campaign: The aim of the signature campaign is to highlight the number of organizations both national and international who are involved in sending, receiving and using volunteers in their programs and projects. This is to bring the attention of the public and the government to the issues that affect volunteerism in Bangladesh. It will provide an opportunity for all the organizations to speak with one voice. The campaign is also to show support and solidarity for the recognition of volunteerism. The title of the signature campaign is Gathering the Momentum; Building the Consensus; Making the Case: Advocating for Volunteer Recognition in Bangladesh.
In the next few weeks, several meetings will be held and committees have been formed. It is our duty as heads of organization to rally support and take advantage of this day.
It is our duty to come together and speak with one voice towards recognizing volunteerism in Bangladesh and promoting the huge contribution that volunteers could make in the fight against poverty.
Download the signatures (PDF file).
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Statement by H.E. Mr. M. Saifur Rahman
Honourable Minister for Finance and Planning
Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh
Mr. Chairman,
I deem it a great honour to address the Twenty-Eighth Session of the Governing Council of International Fund for Agricultural Development in this eternal city of Rome. On behalf of my delegation and on my own behalf I take this opportunity to heartily congratulate Mr. Lennart Bage on his renewal mandate as President of IFAD which is a fitting recognition to his dynamic stewardship. I wish him a very successful tenure.
Mr. Chairman,
IFAD new Calendar for the year 2005 with printed slogan that I saw the other day reads ‘Enabling the rural poor to overcome poverty I believe, this statement captures the sprit of IFAD’s mandate aimed at livelihood improvement and food security of the rural poor who are always vulnerable, marginalized and powerless It will be pertinent to note that the devastating effect of the Tsunami had been far greater on poorer people compared to the rich areas of the countries that faced this disaster. IFAD’s innovative and strategic approach, as we have seen and learnt, is to support the rural areas to break the poverty cycle by improving their own living through a sustainable development generating pro poor employment and income generation to participate meaningfully in the socio-economic process.
As we understand, poverty has many fronts. It is about income levels, it is about food security; about asset basis; about quality of life. It is about vulnerabilities. So our fight against poverty has to be waged in many fronts. And there we find IFAD with its innovative ideas and effective strategies as a willing partner. IFAD’s novel approach, as evident now, enables marginal and small f to access and utilize micro-finance services to invest in farm and off-farm enterprises. Such services together with linkages to ‘technical support enables these marginal and poor farmers to increase agricultural productivity, diversify income sources raising household income, reducing vulnerability and improving food security. This approach has worked well for Bangladesh and I believe other LDCs will have benefited through its strategy.
Mr. Chairman,
Now, I would like to share with you our vision and mission towards a poverty-free Bangladesh based on equity and social justice. Despite high population density; decreasing availability of agricultural land; a very high vulnerability to natural disasters and land degradation the country has made important gains in the fight against poverty. In this connection I would like to inform you that Bangladesh supports its development goals through mobilizing mainly internal resources and the yearly budgetary outlay runs over 10 billion dollar of which, 10% are from external resources. Of this 10% external resources two thirds comes from multilateral sources and only one third comes from bilateral sources. This is to highlight our determination to self-reliant economic growth and poverty alleviation.
Bangladesh enjoys one of the lowest volatility in growth rate by global standards. It has also the success story of achieving significant decline in population growth rate and has graduated to the club “of medium human development” countries according to UNDP’s ranking. Bangladesh has achieved gender parity in Primary and Secondary education and government is determined to push it to vocational and higher levels. Our focus on rural development and rural growth-centers has provided the rural entrepreneurs quick market access having socio-economic dimensions. As regards Bangladesh’s progress towards Millennium Development Goals ( MDGs), we are well ahead on the path towards reducing income poverty and is ‘on track’ on a number of targets like infant mortality, child morality, eradication of hunger, expansion of primary and secondary education and reducing gender disparity. Despite such progress, the aggregate poverty rates, remains very high. Extreme poverty, mostly seasonal, still persist in some rural areas.
The government of Bangladesh recognizes agriculture and rural economy as the key driver of pro-poor growth strategy in light of our Rural Development Policy. Hence under the Annual Development Programme (ADP), Govt. has been allocating substantial amount of money for rural development and rural institutions building. For the years 2002 to 2005, the govt. has invested US$ 1.2 billion dollar (1,190 million) in those areas. But the problem is so staggering that even more investment is needed for rural development and employment generation.
Mr. Chairman,
As noted earlier we have made not enough in our poverty reduction endeavours. GDP growth of 5.5% has been achieved in the FY 2004. Inflation has come down to 5%. Initiatives have been taken to revitalize the Capital & Share markets. Steps have been taken to boost trade & commerce and to reduce export-import and regional trade gaps. In education sector students enjoy full free schooling at Primary level and free schooling for females up to Higher Secondary level. Moreover, stipends are given to the female students to empower women and eliminate gender disparity. In the financial year 2004-2005 we have made maximum budget allocation of US$ 887 million for Education sector, US$ 643 million for Health & Nutrition, Population and Family Welfare sector.
Mr. Chairman,
Internal resources of poor countries are not enough to make up the huge gap that is needed to reach the MDGs. Obviously, we need to do lot more to ensure adequate funding for poverty alleviation and social development. I would like to call on the donor community to increase their contributions to the poor countries and agencies which are explicitly mandated to fight poverty and hunger. It is not out of context at this stage, considering that 2005 is the beginning of the negotiations for the 7 replenishment for IFAD, that donor community is called on to increase their contributions to IFAD so that the agency, known for its anti-poverty programmes worldwide, could dispense its responsibility effectively.
Mr. Chairman,
IFAD, has always been a trusted partner of Bangladesh in its development and endeavour. The contribution of IFAD has particularly been laudable in the areas of aquaculture, technical support in micro-finance, agricultural extension and intensification, rural infrastructure and crop diversification. Given the importance of rural sector in Bangladesh economy and the significant contribution it makes to Gross Domestic Product (50%), the supportive role of IFAD in our rural development efforts has been quite significant With its local level operations in 114 countries, the projects undertaken by the organization have enabled many to increase the standard of living by fostering income generation, social development, gender equity, improved nutritional status and environmental sustainability. We look forward to working in close collaboration with IFAD to meet the future challenges, particularly to achieve the Millennium Development Goals “to halve by the year 2015 the portion of the world’s people whose income is less than one dollar a day”.
Mr. Chairman,
In the end, I would like to wish IFAD a great success in its endeavour to help governments fighting rural poverty and at the same time I would like to reassure the governing council that IFAD will always find Bangladesh a supporting partner in achieving its laudable missions to fight poverty in all its dimension.
Thank you all ladies and gentlemen.
About IFAD
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a specialized agency of the United Nations, was established as an international financial institution in 1977 as one of the major outcomes of the 1974 World Food Conference. The Conference was organized in response to the food crises of the early 1970s that primarily affected the Sahelian countries of Africa. The conference resolved that "an International Fund for Agricultural Development should be established immediately to finance agricultural development projects primarily for food production in the developing countries". One of the most important insights emerging from the conference was that the causes of food insecurity and famine were not so much failures in food production, but structural problems relating to poverty and to the fact that the majority of the developing world’s poor populations were concentrated in rural areas.
IFAD is dedicated to eradicating rural poverty indeveloping countries. Seventy-five per cent of the world's poorest people - 1.05 billion women, children and men - live in rural areas and depend on agriculture and related activities for their livelihoods.
Working with rural poor people, governments, donors, non-governmental organizationsand many other partners, IFAD focuses on country-specific solutions, which can involve increasing rural poor peoples' access to financial services, markets, technology, land and other natural resources.
IFAD's Strategic Framework for 2007-2010
IFAD's activities are guided by the Strategic Framework for IFAD 2007-2010: Enabling the rural poor to overcome poverty.
Goal
IFAD's goal is to empower poor rural women and men in developing countries to achieve higher incomes and improved food security.
Objectives
IFAD will ensure that poor rural people have better access to, and the skills and organization they need to take advantage of:
- Natural resources, especially secure access to land and water, and improved natural resource management and conservation practices
- Improved agricultural technologies and effective production services
- A broad range of financial services
- Transparent and competitive markets for agricultural inputs and produce
- Opportunities for rural off-farm employment and enterprise development
- Local and national policy and programming processes
All of IFAD's decisions - on regional, country and thematic strategies, poverty reduction strategies, policy dialogue and development partners - are made with these principlesand objectives in mind. As reflected in the strategic framework, IFAD is committed to achieving the Millennium Development Goals, in particular the target to halve the proportion of hungry and extremely poor people by 2015.
Working in partnership to eradicate rural poverty
Through low-interest loans and grants, IFAD works with governments to develop and finance programmes and projects that enable rural poor people to overcome poverty themselves.
Since starting operations in 1978, IFAD has invested US$10.8 billion in 805 projects and programmes that have reached more than 340 million poor rural people.
Governments and other financing sources in recipient countries, including project participants, contributed US$15.3 billion, and multilateral, bilateral and other donors provided approximately another US$9.5 billion in cofinancing.
This represents a total investment of about US$24.8 billion, and means that for every dollar IFAD invested, it was able to mobilize almost two dollars in additional resources.
IFAD tackles poverty not only as a lender, but also as an advocate for rural poor people. Its multilateral base provides a natural global platform to discuss important policy issues that influence the lives of rural poor people, as well as to draw attention to the centrality of rural development to meeting the Millennium Development Goals.
IFAD membership
Membership in IFAD is open to any state that is a member of the United Nations or its specialized agencies or the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Governing Council is IFAD's highest decision-making authority, with 165 Member States represented by a Governor and Alternate Governor and any other designated advisers. The Council meets annually. The Executive Board, responsible for overseeing the general operations of IFAD and approving loans and grants, is composed of 18 members and 18 alternate members. The President, who serves for a four-year term (renewable once), is IFAD's chief executive officer and chair of the Executive Board.
The current President of IFAD is Mr Kanayo Nwanze, who was elected for a four-year term in 2009.
For more than a decade, the international development community has increased its focus on measuring and improving results. Donors and developing countries alike want to know that aid is being used as effectively as possible, and they want to be able to measure results. The aim is to ensure that development work leads to tangible and sustained improvements in the lives of people in developing countries. This is implicit in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were adopted by 189 countries in 2000, and the Monterrey Consensus of 2002, which stressed the need to mobilize financial resources more efficiently. The Joint Marrakesh Memorandum in 2004 signalled a renewed emphasis on making aid effective. This was reinforced by the Paris Declarationof 2005 and is being emphasised in the work already underway for the Accra 2008 meeting.
IFAD is working in many ways to improve its development effectiveness.
The Strategic Framework 2007 to 2010 charts IFAD’s new directions and new ways of working in response to the needs of poor rural people in a rapidly changing world. It reflects our response to the evolving international development agenda and the need for increased and more effective investment in reducing rural poverty and hunger. Its purpose is to ensure that IFAD’s operations have the greatest possible impact for poor rural people.
In 2005, IFAD’s Executive Board approved an Action Plan for 2007 to 2009 to make IFAD’s work more effective, efficient and relevant. The Action Plan calls for comprehensive improvements in the way we work and interact with clients and partners.
As part of our efforts to meet our Action Plan targets by 2009, IFAD has adopted theManaging for Development Results (MfDR) approach. MfDR is a management strategy that provides a framework for assessing performance, learning from experiences and using resources more efficiently. It encourages organizations to ask three fundamental questions:
- What results do we wish to achieve?
- What will we do to reach these results?
- How will we know whether we have achieved them?
IFAD is also participating in the One UN reform efforts that call upon UN agencies to “deliver as one, in true partnership and serving the needs of all countries.” IFAD has strengthened its ties to the other Rome-based UN agencies: the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP). Together, we are exploring ways to expand and deepen our collaboration at the global, regional and country level. A joint exercise between the agencies is identifying gaps and opportunities for greater collaboration.
At the country level, “delivering as one” means that the different UN bodies must work as a single team. Today, IFAD is participating in the One UN pilot initiative in eight countries.
Evaluation
The Office of Evaluation (OE) is responsible for evaluating IFAD’s operations and policies. In April 2003, the Executive Board approved IFAD’s newEvaluation Policy which led to OE’s new independent status: OE now reports directly to the Executive Board.
OE evaluates IFAD’s projects and programmes to assess what works and what doesn’t and to determine how far IFAD’s policies and strategies are successful in tackling poverty alleviation in rural areas. In identifying key insights and recommendations drawn from evaluation findings, OE is also concerned, in accordance with IFAD’s disclosure policy, with communicating and sharing IFAD’s knowledge and experienceof rural and agricultural development with a wider audience. OE's evaluation is based on a coherent set of evaluation methodologies.
The role of the Executive Board with regard to the Office of Evaluation is to:
- oversee IFAD’s evaluation work and assess the overall quality and impact of IFAD’s programmes and projects as documented in evaluation reports
- approve OE's annual work programme and budget
- approve policies aimed at enhancing the independence and effectiveness of the evalulation function at IFAD
- receive directly from OE all evaluation reports, including the annual report on the results and impact of IFAD operations
- endorse the appointment, removal or renewal of service of the OE Director
The Evaluation Committee is a sub-committee of the Executive Board which performs in-depth reviews of selected evaluation issues, thus enhancing the effectiveness of the Executive Board. Meeting at least four times a year, the Evaluation Committee reviews OE’s strategies and methodologies, discusses selected evaluation reports and OE’s annual work programme and budget. It also makes suggestions for including evaluations of particular interest to the Committee in OE’s annual work programme. From time to time, the Evaluation Committee may request the chairperson of the Executive Board to include certain evaluation issues on the Board's agenda.
The committee’s current composition is as follows: Belgium, Germany, India, Mali, Mexico, Nigeria, Sweden, Switzerland and Indonesia in the Chair until the end of the mandate of the current Committee (April 2009).
Who's Who in the Office of Evaluation
Professional Staff | General Service Staff |
Luciano Lavizzari | Laura Morgia Anna Benassi |
Majid Benabdellah | Marie-Louise Ndiaye (CPE Niger) |
Andrew Brubaker | Mary Netto |
Michael Carbon | |
Luigi Cuna | |
Chiara Grimaldi | |
Mark Keating | Melba Alvarez |
Ashwani Muthoo | Kendra White Linda Danielsson |
Oanh Nguyen | |
Paul André Rochon | Miriam Irias |
Frederik Teufel | |
Miguel Torralba | Miriam Irias |
Pietro Turilli | Marie-Louise Ndiaye |
Jicheng Zhang | |
Lucy Ariano |
IFAD in Bangladesh: voices from the field
Tailor-made: farmer-friendly financial services transform lives in northern Bangladesh
Northern Bangladesh is home to some of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable rural people. The area, like the rest of the country, is frequently hit by floods and cyclones. Its smallholder farmers are trapped in poverty, largely excluded from borrowing and knowledge of farming practices that could help improve their lives and protect them from potential risks. An IFAD-supported project in the north-west and north-central regions of the country has introduced financial services customized to the specific needs of poor farming communities. As a result, incomes are improving and rural people are beginning to lift themselves out of poverty.
Fatima Begum and her husband Razzak are illiterate farmers living in Bachhati village in the Gaibandha district of north-western Bangladesh. Fatima used to work in the village as a day labourer, while Razzak cultivated vegetables on their 1.65-acre (0.67-hectare (ha)) farm and travelled to other districts as a migrant worker to supplement their limited income. Even though they worked hard, they were still very poor – so poor that they were unable to keep their two sons in school.
Then, in December 2005, Fatima joined a group linked to the IFAD-supported Microfinance for Marginal and Small Farmers Project and took out her first loan of 6,000 Bangladeshi takas (BDT – about US$85). She invested in vegetable and banana cultivation and bought a calf. After successfully repaying the loan, Fatima applied for a second loan of BDT 10,000, which she used to plant more crops and buy an ox. The family was on its way to establishing a productive enterprise.
“Small and marginal farming households benefit most from a customized, flexible microcredit system,” says Nigel Brett, IFAD’s country programme manager for Bangladesh. “An initial grace period for repayment of microcredit loans, or the possibility of repaying on a monthly or even seasonal basis can make all the difference to a small farmer as he or she juggles outgoing and incoming funds based on harvests and the ideal time to sell produce.”
An innovative approach
n recent years, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) specializing in microfinance have been extremely successful in reaching poor rural people in Bangladesh. But most have directed lending towards landless households or those with less than 0.2 ha of land, and they have largely excluded smallholder farmers. IFAD and the Government of Bangladesh joined forces with the Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation (PKSF), one of the world’s leading independent microfinance institutions. Together, they pioneered a new approach to delivering financial services to small and marginal farmers in the country. The results have been excellent.
By providing credit to farming communities through local NGOs, the project has introduced flexible financial services that meet the needs of smallholder farmers while solving problems encountered by microfinance projects in the past. Innovations include:
- extending the grace period before repayment starts
- extending the period between payments from weekly to fortnightly, monthly or even quarterly
- requiring regular payments only of service charges during the first part of the loan period
- offering seasonal loans with lump-sum repayment after harvest
In a country where flooding and other extreme weather events are frequent – and can devastate a farmer’s livelihood – the provision of a disaster reserve fund is an important addition to the project’s microfinance package. In 2007 two floods and a storm damaged Fatima’s banana and vegetable fields. Fortunately, she had completed almost 90 per cent of the banana harvest before the storm hit. But she also received free seed from her project group to replant her fields.
Fatima’s small farm has grown each year. Now she has five oxen to fatten for sale, and she has bought an additional 21 decimals (0.085 ha) of land. In 2007 she earned a total of BDT 82,000 (US$1,200) through the sale of bananas and vegetables. The family has been able to buy a diesel pump for water and a rickshaw for transporting produce to the local market. They have even employed farm labourers.
Microcredit and training
Alongside the microfinance services, the project provides training in improved farming techniques, crop diversification and animal husbandry. When Fatima joined her group, she received training in raising livestock and crop cultivation, including vegetable production, paddy seed preservation and beef fattening. This training gave her a solid foundation on which to set up her small farm.
Training was also fundamental to Ichathon Begum, a microcredit client who has become a prize-winning maize grower. Ichathon and her husband Kabez live with their son and two grandsons in Chargabinda village in the district of Gaibandha. Kabez used to cultivate rice, millet and sweet potatoes, using local varieties and techniques, but struggled to grow enough to maintain his family. When they had to sell 40 decimals of land for a daughter’s marriage, the family became poorer still.
In October 2006, Ichathon joined a microcredit group. The training she received gave her the idea of using part of her first loan to experiment with maize cultivation. At first it seemed risky to abandon traditional crop growing. She planted some cultivated hybrid maize on the family’s 60-decimal plot, and leased a further 20 decimals of land to grow cabbage and cauliflower. She earned BDT 19,500 (US$285) from her first harvest of maize.
While local millet grows sparsely, Ichathon’s maize plants sprang up tall, leafy and healthy. In fact the harvest was so successful that she decided to invest her second loan of BDT 12,000 (US$176) in buying a further 80 decimals of land to plant with maize. Her maize has made her famous locally, and villagers come to learn cultivation techniques from her. She won first prize at a local agricultural fair, and in 2007 her story was broadcast on national television.
Dreams come true
Both Ichathon and Fatima have seen their lives change dramatically. Since Ichathon received her first loan, she has gone on to receive training in livestock rearing. Over the last two years she has bought two milch cows and an ox, and leased a further 40 decimals of land. She is now an active decision-maker in her family. “I’m planning to build a pucca(brick) house, buy the leased land and invest in the education of my grandsons,” she says, “which is something I was unable to do for my own children.”
Fatima built a four-room house and is planning the new one, as well as investing in the education of her grandchildren. Like Ichathon, she has become an active decision-maker in the family, and even owns 16 decimals of land in her own name. “I’m making my dreams come true,” she says.
The project, which started in 2005, will run for six years. Nearly 5,500 groups have formed already, with a total of 97,500 borrowers. Small farmers have been able to pay off moneylenders and rid themselves of the burden of debt that many carried with them perpetually. Better still, they have been able to buy land, make home improvements, vaccinate their poultry, and in some cases, create employment opportunities for others within their villages.
Rural poverty in Bangladesh
Bangladesh is one of the world’s poorest countries, ranking third after India and China in the extent of poverty. The population is predominantly rural, with about 85 per cent of its 135 million people living in rural areas. For their livelihoods rural people depend mainly on the land, which is both fertile and extremely vulnerable. Most of the country is made up of flood plain, and while the alluvial soil provides good arable land, large areas are at risk because of frequent floods and cyclones, which take lives and destroy crops, livestock and property.
Since the 1990s the country has made good progress towards reducing the incidence of poverty, achieving a 1 per cent drop in the proportion of people living below the poverty line every year. Estimates of rural poverty rates now stand between 53 per cent and 43.6 per cent. In general the depth and severity of poverty has been reduced more successfully in rural zones than in urban areas, although rural zones still lag far behind urban areas in terms of development.
Who are the rural poor?
About 20 per cent of rural households live in extreme poverty. Chronically poor people suffer persistent food insecurity, own no cultivable land or assets, are often illiterate and may also suffer serious illnesses or disabilities. Another 29 per cent of the rural population is considered moderately poor. They may own a small plot of land and some livestock, but while they generally have enough to eat, their diets lack protein and other nutritional elements. This segment of the rural population is at risk of sliding deeper into poverty as a result of health problems or natural disasters. Injury or crop failure caused by unexpected and severe weather conditions frequently ruins the livelihoods and the hopes of many Bangladeshis.
Small-scale farmers may subsist at either of these levels of poverty. Their livelihoods are precarious, both because of the seasonal nature of farm income and because natural disasters such as floods and drought may periodically destroy their crops and animals.
Women are among the poorest of the rural poor, especially when they are the sole heads of their households, such as widows or wives of men who have migrated in search of employment. They suffer discrimination because of their gender, they have scarce income-earning opportunities and their nutritional intake is often inadequate. Among extremely poor people, there is a disproportionate number of households headed by women.
Fishing communities are also among the poorest and most disadvantaged groups in the country.
Where are they?
Aside from hilly areas in the extreme north-east and south-east, Bangladesh is made up entirely of low-lying deltaic flood plain. Poverty is concentrated in three areas: the north-west, which is prone to drought and river erosion; the centre-north, which is subject to severe seasonal flooding that limits crop production; and the southern coastal zones, which are affected by soil salinity. The direct link between chronic poverty and unfavourable agricultural environments is becoming increasingly apparent, partly as the result of difficult climatic conditions and partly as a consequence of mismanagement of natural resources and the enormous population pressure on the land.
Why are they poor?
One of the main causes of rural poverty in Bangladesh is the erratic and extreme climate and the fact that a large proportion of the country is low-lying and vulnerable to flooding. Many of Bangladesh 's rural poor people live in areas subject to extreme annual flooding, which can destroy their crops, homes and livelihoods. They often have to resort to moneylenders in order to rebuild their lives, which pushes them deeper into poverty. For the large numbers of rural poor people whose subsistence depends on agriculture, income and food security are highly precarious. Many farmers eke out a livelihood on small and fragmented plots. For those who are landless or almost landless, the situation is even more severe. Almost half of the population falls into this category.
Another root cause of rural poverty has been the enormous population growth and the pressure this has placed on the environment, unleashing problems such as erosion and flooding that in turn aggravate the situation of rural poor people.
Bangladesh has made progress in developing rural infrastructure, but much remains to be done. Many poor people living in remote areas lack services such as education, health clinics and adequate roads, particularly road links to markets. Only 19 per cent of rural households have electricity.
