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Published on October 17, 2016
"World Bank is one of our leading development partners ... I hope it would play a more pro-active role in our endeavours for materializing Vision 2021 and Vision 2041," she said.
Sheikh Hasina also vowed to work together to free this beautiful world from poverty and hunger. "Not only our country, we want to free the whole world from hunger and poverty. To achieve the goal, we would continue our strides ... it's our commitment," she said.
The premier was addressing a public event organized by Economic Relations Division on the occasion of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty at Osmani Memorial Auditorium here this afternoon.
World Bank Group President Jim Young Kim was present at the function as the special guest, while Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith delivered the welcome address.
World Bank Vice President for South Asian Region Annete Dixton made the opening remarks and Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of World Bank Paul Romer was the keynote speaker. Senior Secretary of ERD Mohammad Mejbahuddin gave the vote of thanks.
The prime minister said Bangladesh hoped that the partnership with the world community will be further strengthened towards our development endeavors.
"All our development plans, 'Vision 2021' and upcoming 'Vision 2041' are towards realizing our Father of the Nation's dream of building a hunger, poverty, illiteracy and exploitation-free Sonar Bangladesh," she said.
Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh is a country with immense potentials and its people are very brave, committed and hard-working. "The resilient people of this country are firmly determined to change their future and build a better Bangladesh for the next generations," she said.
The government, Sheikh Hasina said, has formulated a National Social Security Strategy (NSSS) with a view to strengthening the poverty impact of the public spending. Bangladesh in fact now aims to eliminate hunger and poverty from the country well ahead of the global target.
"I acknowledge the contributions of all actors, national, regional and international to our development efforts," she said.
The prime minister said Bangladesh has been quite successful in managing its macro-economy very prudently. "While the average GDP growth rate for the last ten years was 6.4 percent, we have been successful in raising growth rate to 7.1 percent in Fiscal Year 2015-16," she said.
Sheikh Hasina said her government has already started the implementation of the 7th Five Year Plan (FY 2016-20) and the major thrusts of this plan are to accelerate growth, reduce poverty, and empower the citizens. "The average growth rate is projected at 7.4 percent over the Seventh Plan period with 8 percent growth at the terminal year," she said.
The premier said per capita income has increased to USD 1,466 and country's progress in other economic indicators is also continuing to build a solid foundation for achieving an upper middle income country status and also to eradicate poverty in all forms.
She said despite global economic slowdown, country's export earnings, remittances and foreign direct investment all grew by almost 3 times over the last seven years and the foreign exchange reserve jumped from USD 3.5 billion to USD 31 billion during this time.
"Overall investment increased from 26 percent of GDP to 29.4 percent. In FY 2009-10, the size of Annual Development Programme (ADP) was Tk 285 billion while the size of ADP in FY2016-17 is Tk. 1233.45 billion," she said.
The prime minister also highlighted her government's success in power generation, education, health, women empowerment, ICT and disaster management.
While talking about climate change issue, Sheikh Hasina said it has been a major developmental challenge in the country. "It subverts many of our development achievements. Though Bangladesh has been acclaimed internationally for good disaster management, it is still one of the most vulnerable countries that suffer and will continue to suffer from climate change issues," she said.
The prime minister hoped that the implementation of Paris Climate Agreement will ensure climate justice. "We are also trying to build climate-resilient infrastructures and undertake other development interventions considering climate change issues," she said.
In her speech, the World Bank president highly praised Bangladesh's stunning success in socioeconomic development, especially poverty reduction. "Bangladesh made impressive record in reducing poverty and it can inspire other countries," he said.
In this connection, Jim Young Kim mentioned that 25 million people of Bangladesh came out of poverty line in the last 10 years.
He also pointed out Bangladesh's success in family planning and education sector, particularly female education as well as combating natural disasters.
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