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The People's Republic of BANGLADESH Surface Area (1997) 144,000 km2 Population (1999) in million 127.669 Population Growth (1999) 2 % p.a. Urban Population (1999) 24 % of total Population Density (1997) 950 inh./ km2 GDP (1999) in billion US$ 45.779 GNP (1999) in billion US$ 46.96 GNP per capita (1999) US$ 370 Government Revenue (1999) 9.0 % of GDP Government Expenditure (1999) 17.0 % of GDP Monetary Unit Bangladesh Taka Human Development Indicator (1998) 0.461 HDI Rank out of 174 countries 146 A. General Information Geography, Topography and Climate Bangladesh borders on India for 95 % of the total land boundary, while the rest faces with Burma (Myanmar) in the Southeast. In the South, the country fronts on the Bay of Bengal (in the Indian Ocean), to which the main rivers, the Ganges (the Padma) and the Brahmaputra (the Jamuna) flow. The topography of the country is predominantly characterized by the delta of flat alluvial plain (less than 10m above sea level) which represents more than 90% of the land area, with some mountainous areas in the Southeast. The temperatures range from about 20°C to 35°C, through the dry/cold season (mid. October to February), hot season (mid. March to mid. May) and rainy season (May to early October). The two sub-seasons of cyclone are observed in May to June and October to November. Together with the dominant topographical characteristic of the low flat land, the tropical-monsoon climate causes massive scale of flood, cyclones and droughts countrywide. While approximately 70% of the country is arable fertile land, the natural calamities make the country vulnerable and unstable, particularly in terms of socio-economic activities associated with agriculture and food security. 2 Characteristics and Recent Evolutions of Political System Following the independence in 1947 from British India and in 1971 from Pakistan, the People's Republic of Bangladesh adopted a constitutional republic system. The executive branch consists of President as Head of State (elected by Members of Parliament to serve for 5 years), Prime Minister as Head of Government (typically, leader of the largest party in the ruling coalition) and Cabinet as Council of Ministers (selected by Prime Minister and appointed by President). The legislative branch is undertaken by unicameral Parliament staffed by 330 members (300 members elected from single territorial constituencies, and the rest, reserved for women, by the elected Member of Parliaments). Judicial branch is undertaken by the supreme court consisting of Chief Justice and other Justices, who are all appointed by President to serve until the age of 65. Main political parties include Awami League (ruling party in the first government after independence during 1972-1975 and current coalition government since 1996), Bangladesh Communist Party, Bangladesh Nationalist Party (ruling party in the 1991-1995 coalition government), Jamaat-E-Islami and Jatiyo Party. There are four basic administrative entities in Bangladesh, namely (1) 64 zila (districts); (2) 490 thana or upzila (sub-districts, thana was upgraded into upzila as a governance unit in the decentralization program in 1980s), (3) 4 451 unions (clusters of villages); and (4) 59 990 gram (villages). Local government institution at each of these levels is called parishad in the official language of Bangla/Bengali. Urbanized areas are categorized as (semi-autonomous) municipality, counting 119. There are two kinds of municipal governments: pourashava and city corporation, although the distinction between them are not so clear. At district level, hill tract areas are specifically categorized, where tribal communities inhabit. They are administered under the provision of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Manual issued by the Ministry of Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs. The entire country is divided into 6 'divisions' at a level equivalent to 'region' i.e. Batisal, Chittagong, Dhaka, Khulna, Rajshahi and Sylhet. Agriculture in Bangladesh Representing about 30% of the GDP, agriculture continues to be the most important sector in Bangladesh. This is in a sense that it plays significant role in the production of food for, and the provision of employment and income to, the poor. The vast 3 majority of the Bangladeshi or 83% of the total population reside in rural areas, of which more than half live below the poverty line, and 66% of the total labor force are engaged in agriculture. Bangladesh is yet to be able to fully exploit the potentials of its fertile soil and water resources for agricultural development to ensure food security. Main agricultural commodities include rice, wheat, jute, tobacco, sugarcane, pulses, oilseeds, spices, potato and some vegetables and tropical fruits. While it is relatively self-sufficient in rice (Boro Rice), the country depends upon imports for about 14% of its food requirement. This is largely owing to the nature of agricultural production in Bangladesh, which is prone to massive-scale and -magnitude of natural calamities, besides degrading natural resources. Despite the considerable food grain production, which even exceed the population growth, the country has been unable to solve mal- and under-nutrition of its people, particularly women and children. The poverty situation of the country requires enhanced efforts on sustainable agricultural production and food entitlements for food and nutrition security of the people, particularly the rural poor across gender and generation. According to the country's fifth five-year plan (1997-2001), a strategic emphasis is placed on improving the agricultural output values and producers' income levels by encouraging more participation from agro-industrial and agribusiness sectors. Private sector participation is a key policy strategy of the Government in the field of agricultural and rural development, with special reference to small and marginal farmers. Economic Situation The Government of Bangladesh has undertaken a series of comprehensive structural reforms since early 1990s. The reforms include liberalization of foreign trade, exchange rate regime, industrial sector restructuring, strengthening of fiscal and monetary management and encouragement of private sector investment. The GDP growth rate was on the rise, from around 4% in 1970s and 1980s to over 5% during FY 1995/96 to FY 1997/98. The country did not have any significant impacts from the 1997 Asian Economic Crisis, but from the natural calamity: the extensive floods in mid. 1998. Between 1997-1999, the GDP share of the central government expenditure rose from 7.1 % to 17% due to the additional food imports and flood rehabilitation expenditure, whereas the GDP share of the revenue dropped from 9.8% to 9% due to the loss of tax revenue from the economic sectors hit by the floods. While the manufacturing sector has not yet recovered, the agricultural sector 4 has demonstrated its strength in recovery. Provided that the socio-economic impacts of such a natural calamity is felt more harsh and even fatal at the community, household and individual levels, the endemic poverty situation and the associated vulnerability of the poor poses a fundamental agenda for the government to improve the economic benefit-sharing by accelerating public sector structural reforms, amongst other measures. B. Process of Decentralization in Course History, Objective and Responsible Agencies Beyond the political instability and turmoil since the independence in 1971, the Government of Bangladesh (GOB) has made some policy efforts to make devolutionary change to the parishad, or the local government institutions, in several steps: The district governorship was established under the 1972-1974 Government; The gram sarkar or village-level governance units were set up under the 1975-1981 Government; The thana (equivalent to sub-district) was upgraded to upazila with new functions, responsibilities and fund allocation, and thus the 'upazila system' was initiated under the 1982-1990 Government; and the Thana Development and Coordination Committee (TDCC) was established under the 1991-1996 Government. Despite the continuous efforts, the public administration system remained to be centralized and inefficient. In 1996, a positive sign was emerged, when the military regime was overthrown in a peaceful manner by civil society movements on a broad political consensus for democratic and participatory governance. Gathering the political momentum, the Awami League, the ruling party in the current government, included the decentralization policy and devolution of powers in its election manifesto, assuming that empowering local government consolidates the democratization process in the Republic. The Public Administration Reforms Commission was established in 1996 as a main agency to oversee the decentralization process. It is composed of Members of Parliament, university professors, civil servants and NGO representatives. The Commission is empowered to make recommendations on the local government system, particularly the relationship between central and local governments, and the functions, responsibilities and administrative and financial powers of local government. 5 Functions, Resource and Autonomy of Decentralized Entities The functions of each parishad (local governance institutions) at four levels are similar but at different degrees of responsibilities and authorities on resource mobilization to finance local-level activities. The functions include project/program planning (e.g. agricultural production increase, drinking water supply etc.), infrastructure maintenance, natural resource development, management of primary education institutions, awareness raising on health and health care, cooperative/associations development for various socio-economic activities, statistical data collection and registration on socio-economic aspects of households within each jurisdiction (e.g. birth, death, marriage etc.). In legal terms, the parishad are capable to collect taxes, fees and charges from local communities, rents and profits from public properties, returns from public investment and so forth. With these independent sources of revenues, parishad can enjoy a certain level of autonomy. The autonomy of parishad is, in reality, substantially compromised by the grants and subsidies from the Government, which are the most important source of the revenue. For upazila parishad (sub-district government), for instance, most of its development fund was allocated by the central government, from the Annual Development Program (ADP). While the decentralization program transferred a number of responsibilities and associated decision-making and planning capacities to parishad, it left the central administration, particularly the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives, with the means to control the local administration of finance and personnel. C. Decentralization and Rural Development Decentralization and Agricultural and Rural Development Policies Rural development policy was originally designed to be an instrument for agricultural development in 1960s, and the strategies, developed for rural development projects in 1984, include (i) physical infrastructure development in rural areas, (ii) water resource management (irrigation for agriculture, drainage and flood control) and (iii) rural poor-targeted production and employment programs. In these basic strategic components of agricultural and rural development, local governments are assigned to play a certain role. For Component (i), local government is expected to be the main 6 implementing bodies, to which the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED) provides supports. For Component (ii), local government is an associate agency while the Bangladesh Rural Development Board (BRDB) and the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) play a major role. For Component (iii), local government, the BRDB and other concerned public agencies collaborate in operation, expecting nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to play some assisting roles. These strategies are more or less succeeded in the 3rd and 4th five-year plans (1985-1990, 19901995), and some modification and addition were made into the current policy strategies, keeping pace with the political decentralization schedule since 1996 e.g. more involvement of local representatives at union and other levels in the process of rural infrastructure development activities, and enhancement of participatory planning-based rural development activities through strengthening local government institutions and resource mobilization capacities. Agricultural Support Services and Decentralization The limited or lack of agricultural support services is one of the major constraints to agricultural development in Bangladesh, be it effective financial services, marketing and extension supports or weak water/irrigation management. In view of these constraints, the government policy, specifically the 5th five-year development plan (1997-2002), emphasize private sector participation in agricultural development process as a coping strategy, in line with on-going liberalization/structural adjustment. Minor irrigation sector has been undergoing liberalization, encouraging private sector agencies to supply related equipment. International trade and domestic marketing of machinery, seeds and fertilizers are being opened up for market forces. For fertilizers, private dealers are the only distributors to farms, to which government provides no subsidy. Besides private sector, NGOs are also recognized as a main development partner at policy level. The successful experiences by Bangladesh NGOs in rural micro credit schemes, for instance, are widely known. However, while liberalization strategy seems to be in full swing in the agriculture sector, the sectoral policy does not fully incorporate the administrative and political decentralization process. If sustainability and accountability of agricultural support services are to be pursued, however, the role of parishad at each level could be more recognized and emphasized. Market operation by private agencies and facilitating development activities of NGOs could be more oriented towards collaboration with local 7 governance institutions, while enhancing the locality- and gender-sensitive resource mobilization and agricultural and social services. Enabling Policies, Constraints and Evaluation of the Decentralization Process Established in 1996, the Public Administration Reforms Commission was expected to play an enabling role to further the comprehensive decentralization process, by making policy recommendations on local governance system. However, its practice has been insignificant, if not absent. Overall political instability is a basic negative condition in making progress in the pace and effectiveness of decentralization, which has been worsening and increasingly involving violence. At national level, administrative system is still highly centralized, and at local level, widespread corrupt practices hinders the social and political environment for effectively empowering local governance system and its functioning. Prospect Although the democratic change of the government in 1996 renewed the decentralization efforts in the past, the following 4 years project a pessimistic prospect. Administrative and political conditions are fundamental in making efforts to counter a number of problems that the country has long been facing, including frequent and severe natural calamities, chronic mal/under nutrition status of its people, widespread and deep-rooted poverty, amongst others. There should be no delay in proceeding reforms in the governance system, and the process would be required to strike the balance between on-going sectoral liberalization and governments' role at national, and particularly, decentralized levels.