Study On Agricultural Development Strategy For Poverty Alleviation In Bangladesh

Bangladesh with150million populations, is one of the densely populated countries in the world. Despite strong track record, around66million people are still live in poverty and47million people live below poverty line. The government of Bangladesh formulated policies and strategies to guide over all development with focus to rural and agricultural development. This study is therefore an attempt at evaluating the effectiveness of poverty reduction efforts through agricultural development strategy in Bangladesh, especially in relation to the policy and strategy formulation, implementation coordination, monitoring, control and review as well as sourcing and utilization of resources, both human and material and synergy of programs. In agriculture with the passage of time, a number of policies have been developed. But policymakers are confronted with some very recent and previously unsolved problems like growing population, declining food supply, dwindling of agricultural resources and climate change. For sustainable solutions of these problems there is no way but to go for suitable and targeted agricultural policies.The study was conducted in two districts of Bangladesh focusing on the impact of past and current strategies and programs on the target poor by collating, analyzing and interpreting primary and secondary data from the relevant government departments, agencies and beneficiaries. Primary data was collected in quantitative and qualitative methods which incorporated with structured and semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions and opinions of stakeholders and key informants. The main findings of the research indicate that livelihood strategy of the population in the study area did not change that much and it also found that, most of the policies related to agricultural development are not pro-poor. But the policy makers and stakeholders say about successful implementation and achievement. The reality was found from the field study that are still majority of the households fighting with poverty with some significant reasons like low-income, less resources, lack of knowledge, communication gap between farmers and stakeholders which indicates that poverty in Bangladesh is a multi-dimensional phenomenon and would require a synergy of different approaches to contain it properly. Households that are poorly educated, own less land, hold few non-land assets and livestock, and have young children and elderly people are more likely to be chronically poor. Although Bangladesh government has special wings for agricultural development, agencies and programs for poverty reduction, their impacts are hardly felt because of poor implementation and absence of effective monitoring.Further, the measures implemented so far have focused more on growth, basic needs and rural development approaches. For Bangladesh to effectively and significantly reduce poverty, it is recommended that strategies formulated and directed towards poverty reduction need to be holistic in nature. Poverty issues cannot effectively be addressed in isolation of social norms, values and customary practices at different level of the family, community, state or nation. Poverty reduction efforts in Bangladesh can only succeed if responsible agencies and other stakeholders develop multidimensional strategies and implement all set goals along that line. Such efforts should involve both the government (at all tiers) and the civil society for it to be sustainable. Considering the social structure in Bangladesh, government, NGOs, international agencies, organized private sector and households could play active roles in the provision of basic social services. Efforts should be made to effectively target the poor in all considerations and at all levels of articulations, implementation, monitoring and review. The government anti-corruption efforts should be intensified to deal with issues concerning poverty alleviation. In the end, sustainable poverty alleviation should not only focus on social welfare measures but also should aim at asset redistribution and creation of incentive structures; ensuring food security; boosting purchasing power of the farmers by increasing their real income, generating employment for all in the agriculture sector, and improving their quality of life; and that can enhance the rate and pattern of economic growth down to the rural areas in Bangladesh.