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Bangladesh up on human development scale

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The United Nations has listed Bangladesh as one of the 18 countries in the world that have made rapid progress in human development in the last three decades, though occupying a rather low position.

The United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) “2013 Human Development Report”, released on Friday in Dhaka as elsewhere in the world, measured national achievements in health, education and income to rank countries in the Human Development Index (HDI).

With Bangladesh’s 69.2 years of life expectancy at birth, 8.1 expected years of schooling, 4.8 average years of schooling and $1,785 per capita income, the country has been ranked 146th, , carrying 0.515 weightage in the index, among the 187 countries.

The Bangladesh’s position, which cannot be compared with the previous report as the UNDP says methodologies have been changed, is equal to Pakistan, despite the fact that Bangladesh’s health and education sector have seen substantial progresse.

“It is because of income level. Pakistan’s per capita income is $2,566,” said UNDP Bangladesh’s Assistant Country Director KAM Morshed while presenting the report.

He said Pakistan was ‘in better position’ than Bangladesh in 1980 from where they started to see the progress trend.

Bangladesh was ranked 147th in the 2012 report.

The 2013 report — The Rise of the South: Human Progress in a Diverse World — presented the story of over 40 developing countries that have made ‘striking human development gains’ in the recent years.

The report attributed their achievements to strong national commitment to better public health and education services, innovative poverty eradication programmes and strategic engagement with the world economy.

“The South as a whole is driving global economic growth and social change for the first time in centuries,” said Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator, in the foreword.

The report also acknowledged sustained economic growth of Bangladesh driven by textiles.

“By 2010, Bangladesh’s share of world apparel exports increased to about 4.8 percent, from about 0.8 percent in 1990,” it said.

It showed that between 1980 and 2012, Bangladesh’s life expectancy at birth increased 14 years, mean years of schooling increased by 2.8 years and expected years of schooling by 3.7 years.

It said Bangladesh’s per capita income had also increased by about 175 percent between 1980 and 2012.

UNDP Country Director Pauline Tamesis said in contrast to the emerging economic powers, ‘Bangladesh’s human development progress has been still stronger than the economic gains.’

“This country’s across-the-board performance, mapped by growth in its HDI, has been exceptional – which has grown by some 65 percent on 1980.”

The highlights also include a very strong performance with regard to gender, in regional terms.

But Dhaka University’s Professor of Economics Dr Selim Raihan was cautious in his remarks.

He said Bangladesh had definitely progressed in the last three decades like other countries, ‘but we are not pro-active development state that has been highlighted in the report.’

“Even our related ratings with other countries have not changed,” he said.

The report highlighted progress of 18 countries -- Korea, Chile, Mexico, Malaysia, Mauritius, Brazil, Turkey, Tunisia, Thailand, China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Ghana, India, Lao PDR, Bangladesh, Uganda and Rwanda – for being proactive development states, their integration with the global market and determined social innovation.

He said Bangladesh’s economic growth had led the human development. “We did not notice that our human resource development has led the economic growth.”

He said in a proactive development state, ‘there must be institutional and economic growth coming from investment in the human resource development.’

“Our investment in the health sector is still low and our school dropout rate is very high,” he said.

He, however, said Bangladesh had integrated itself with the global market.

Norway, Australia and the United States lead the UN rankings.
source: Bangladesh up on human development scale - bdnews24.com
 
Its great news but the score of Bangladesh could be more high. Some important note of this ranking is that Bangladesh has been placed ahead of Pakistan in this rank for the first time despite it used to rank 1 below earlier with .5 less point. Now both has .515 point. Difference between Bangladesh and India also has been reduced from earlier 12 to present 10 where India lost 2 position this time and in terms of HDI point the difference has been reduced to .039 from .045 earlier. As this year due to changing of base year per capita GDP is going to see a rise which will also be reflected in the HDI ranking.

Current positions are as follow:

136 India (.554) (2 position down)

146 Bangladesh (.515) (Steady)

146 Pakistan (.515) (1 position down)
 
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