Economists have stated that in the first fifty years of the country’s independence, the primary forces behind Bangladesh’s economic development were farmers, industrial workers, particularly those in the garment industry, and Bangladeshi migrants employed overseas.
The book Fifty years of Bangladesh: economy, politics, society and culture, which was launched at a function at the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) in Dhaka, stated that while their contribution to the development will not remain the same, the growth trajectory in the next years will.
The book depicts the complex aspects of Bangladesh’s growth path, including its political and cultural disputes as well as its economic and social transformation. The book presents new empirical data supplemented with a critical analysis of processes, actors and actions that have been the drivers of Bangladesh’s transformation.
At the launch, Selim Raihan, executive director of the South Asian Network of Economic Modelling and one of the writers of the book, said the economy grew when institutional weakness rose and regulatory standards deteriorated.
The coalition against reform and persistent corruption are the cause of fear for the future.
He went on, “Political consensus is required to solve them.”
The reason for Bangladesh’s economic success was not a miracle. Furthermore, Rizwanul Islam, a former special adviser on employment sector at the International Labour Office in Geneva, stated that labour was the primary factor in achieving GDP growth.
Prof Rehman Sobhan, chairman of the CPD; Hossain Zillur Rahman, executive chairman of the Power and Participation Research Centre; Mustafizur Rahman, a distinguished fellow of the CPD, and Zahid Hussain, a former lead economist of the World Bank’s Dhaka office, also talked at the event.
