SACEPS6

Paper No.
A SACEPS Dialogue on
Follow up of SAARC Summit Decisions Concerning
the Report of the Independent South Asian Commission
on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA)
Price: Tk 45.00
SOUTH ASIA CENTRE FOR POLICY STUDIES (SACEPS)

Secretariat: Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD)
House 40C, Road 11, Dhanmondi R/A, GPO Box 2129, Dhaka 1209, Bangladesh
Tel: 8124770; Fax: 8130951; E-mail: cpd@bdonline.com ; rehman@citecho.net
Website: www.cpd-bangladesh.org
July, 2004
The South Asia Centre for Policy Studies (SACEPS) emerged out of a recognised need to
build an institution that would give a distinct shape to the realisation of a shared future
for South Asia. The centre was originally set up at Centre for Policy Research (CPR) in
Delhi in 1999, but later in July 2000 it was moved to Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD),
Dhaka which is now hosting the SACEPS. The overall objective of SACEPS is to promote
regional cooperation amongst the member countries of South Asian Association for
Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in the field of development research, policy studies and
policy advocacy.
Major activities and programmes of SACEPS will include undertaking research

programme, arranging policy dialogues and consultative meetings, publishing reports,
creating a network on South Asian studies and cooperation etc. Such dialogues and
meetings would provide opportunities for representatives from various walks of civil
society drawn from the South Asian region to periodically assemble and discuss issues for
promotion of South Asian cooperation and the socio-economic transformation of the
region.
In order to sustain the commitment of policymakers towards South Asian Cooperation a

series of Task Forces, bringing together eminent South Asians as members, were set up by
SACEPS. These Task Forces are expected to deal with issues of immediate importance for
cooperation such as SAFTA, the WTO, Investment Cooperation, Cooperation in the
Energy Sector, South Asian Macro Economic Policies and a South Asia Social Charter.
SACEPS is also exploring the possibility of establishing a South Asian Economic Forum
to bring together national, business and civil society leaders to meet informally to
collectively discuss the future of the region and explore avenues of cooperation.
The present report containing the highlights of the A SACEPS Dialogue on Follow up of
SAARC Summit Decisions Concerning the Report of the Independent South Asian
Commission on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA) was organised by SACEPS in
collaboration with CPD on Friday, February 27, 2004 at the BRAC Centre , Dhaka.
Report prepared by: Mr Tauhidul Hoque Chowdhury, Programme Associate, CPD

Series Editor: Professor Rehman Sobhan, Executive Director, SACEPS and
Chairman, Centre for Policy Dialogue
SACEPS Paper 6
A SACEPS Dialogue on
Report of the Regional seminar on the follow up of SAARC Summit
decisions concerning the Independent South Asian Commission on
Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA)
Introduction
The South Asia Centre for Policy Studies (SACEPS), in collaboration with the Centre for
Policy Dialogue (CPD) held a national dialogue on the Follow-up of the SAARC Summit
decisions concerning the Report of the Independent South Asian Commission on Poverty
Alleviation (ISACPA), at the BRAC Centre, Dhaka on February 27, 2004.
Professor Muchkund Dubey, President, Council for Social Development and Former
Foreign Secretary, Government of India chaired the session. Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui,
Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, Government of Bangladesh and Co-chair of
ISACPA attended the session as Chief Guest. Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahman, Executive
Chairman, Power and Participation Research Centre (PPRC) and Member, ISACPA
presented the report (a summary of the report is annexed). Dr. Godfrey Gunatilleke,
Deputy Chairman, Council of Fellows, Marga Institute, Sri Lanka and Convenor of
SACEPS Task Force on the Citizen’s Social Charter; Dr. Quazi Mesbahuddin Ahmed,
Member (GED), Planning Commission; Professor M. M. Akash, Department of
Economics, University of Dhaka and Ms. Khawar Mumtaz, Coordinator, Shirkat Gah and
Coordinator, Citizen’s Social Charter preparatory Task Force, Pakistan, also attended the
session as designated discussants. Eminent experts, civil society members, political
leaders, bureaucrats, professionals and journalists took part in the four-hour-long dialogue.
A list of participants is annexed.
Opening Remarks by Professor Rehman Sobhan

Professor Rehman Sobhan, Executive Director, SACEPS, and Chairman, CPD, in his
opening statement explained the purpose of the programme. SACEPS is a body
representing a group of South Asian institutions committed to cooperation in the region.
Its secretariat is located at the CPD. Together with CPD, SACEPS is organising a series of
programmes which are designed to review the outcomes of the Islamabad SAARC summit
with a view to identifying the key decisions taken at the summit and ensuring
implementation of the major initiatives. In this connection, he drew the attention of the
participants to the three major decisions that were taken at the SAARC summit:
• The approval of the framework agreement for a South Asian Free Trade Area.
A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 1

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• The signing of the SAARC Social Charter.

• The approval of the ISACPA report and its recommendations.
Decisions were taken to organise two public seminars on the occasion of the meeting of
the Task Force on the Social Charter set up by SACEPS for preparing a citizen’s social
charter. This seminar on the ISACPA report was the first of the two seminars and was
designed to draw attention to the findings of the Report of the Independent South Asian
Commission on Poverty Alleviation and the follow-up on implementing its
recommendations.
In this connection, he pointed out that the South Asia Centre for Policy Studies as part of
its agenda to promote South Asian cooperation had constituted six task forces comprising
competent professional communities and institutions of South Asia. These Task Forces
have now mostly completed their work which covered:
a. Investment cooperation in South Asia

b. Energy cooperation in South Asia
c. Issues related to South Asia’s strategy for the next round of WTO negotiations
d. The implications of building a South Asian Free Trade Area
e. Macro-economic policies within South Asia
f. The Citizen’s Social Charter for South Asia
Prof. Sobhan noted that poverty issues have been very much in the forefront of the agenda
of SACEPS. The next major programme which has been taken up is focused around the
issue of eradication of poverty in South Asia, and may be regarded as follow-up on the
process of poverty alleviation. “Therefore, we all remain committed to poverty alleviation,
but conceptually and qualitatively, this should basically lead us to poverty eradication and
in this sense therefore ISACPA is an important landmark,” he added. He recalled that
ISACPA was not the first such commission; the SAARC Summit had earlier constituted a
commission which was chaired by Mr. Bhatrai, the former Prime Minister of Nepal, who
was also the co-chair of ISACPA. The first commission’s report was approved at the 1993
Dhaka Summit but its recommendations did not make any significant headway and
remained unfulfilled. The ISACPA was constituted at a time when the first commission
had committed the governments of the region to eliminate poverty from South Asia. The
target set by the Dhaka Summit for the elimination of poverty was by 2002 but no heed
was given to this target nor was there any periodic reporting on the progress registered in

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each SAARC country. The important value addition which is expected from the ISACPA
report is that it will be effectively implemented. However, it is not only the responsibility
of the governments but also the civil society organs of the region to contribute to the
processes of its implementation. Civil society can also play a very important advocacy role
in holding governments accountable for realising the commitments they made at the
summit.
Recognising the presence of the Co-chairperson of ISACPA Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui
and Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahman, a member of ISACPA, Prof. Sobhan said that they were
the key people in drafting the report. He also recognised three very eminent South Asians,
Professor Muchkund Dubey, Dr. Godfrey Gunatilleke and Ms. Khawar Mumtaz who were
attending the session.
Presentation on ISACPA
Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahman, Executive Chairman, PPRC and Member, ISACPA, made the
presentation of the report.
To begin with, Dr. Zillur observed that it was not the first commission on poverty
alleviation. The first commission was set up in 1992 and it was reconstituted in 2002. The
task of the commission was to develop a more feasible plan of action in the field of
poverty.
Introducing the report, he said the report was prepared by taking inputs of two members
from each of the seven SAARC countries and also inputs from the earlier report. The
report was made on the basis of the earlier one and that was how the group decided they
should work.
He said that in the first commission report there was a very important and overarching
strategic idea which is relevant even today. It was social mobilisation in order to address
the theme of the poverty in South Asia. But the challenge for them was to add to that
vision through identifying more concrete initiatives.
He pointed out that in 2002 there were two more contexts which had to be taken into
consideration. Firstly, compared to 1992, globalisation was a much stronger reality for
South Asia in 2002 and the extent to which it impinged on the Commission’s strategic
ideas was greater. Secondly, ISACPA very strongly felt that issues of implementation had
to be given analytical priority. It is not just a question of details for the bureaucrats. Two
major new contextual considerations around which the commission began the preparation
of the report were: why implementation failures occur and how can one dub

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implementation as one of the core themes of constructing new strategies. The report was
prepared in a very participatory way and every country chipped in with concepts, ideas
etc. he added.
Changes in Indicators
Dr. Zillur reported that poverty is still extremely important for South Asia and coming out
of it remains the dominant challenge. There have been changes in some indicators: Sri
Lanka and Maldives are much ahead on the education indicators; Bangladesh is also
progressing well in some of the indicators. Pakistan has achieved some gains in some
other areas. India has made improvements in some of the indicators. There has, in fact
been, an array of changes. The idea that nothing has moved on the poverty front in South
Asia is not backed up empirical reality.
He pointed out that the trend in case of Bangladesh could not be extrapolated from the
overall South Asian reality. The issue of rising inequality in some areas and the
significance of urbanisation are also related to poverty. Urbanisation has a positive impact
on poverty. The livelihood realities of the poor have gone through tremendous changes.
Migration, remittances etc. in many parts of South Asia have become very important.
He observed that significant changes are evident in the human development area in terms
of key indicators for South Asia. The HDR highlighted that while on some summary
indicators there has been improvement, the question of quality has become top-most
concerns to be addressed in the South Asian region.
Dr. Zillur indicated that there have also been some modest improvements in the poverty
area. But inequality is also a rising issue. He pointed out that a new concern which is now
emerging is the whole issue of pro-poor growth. The poverty and the growth discourses
now have to be combined. A growing realisation is fast gaining ground across the region
that growth cannot be left to the elites and the rich; it must also work for the poor. And
without galvanising growth in that direction, it is difficult to alleviate poverty, let alone
eradicating it.
He pointed out that ISACP tried to grapple with the idea of a strategic starting point to
address the issue. It wanted to establish that if there are some South Asian specificities in
terms of institutional realities, it would try to build the strategies around this premise.
Referring to the Report, on the section on best practices Dr. Zillur said there is a reality in
South Asia. When emphasis was made on social mobilisation, it was focused around the

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potential of the poor to transform the situation. The South Asian reality is one which is
significantly different from the South East Asian or the so called East Asian miracle
realities. That reality was very much driven by policies. He felt that South Asia is not
necessarily driven by a policy-based reality and it is unlikely to be so. He emphasised that
it may not be a policy driven reality in the sense that the leadership structures, policy
structures are driving the whole process of social change.
The Issue of Best Practices

Zillur noted that the quality of South Asian reality is the first building block on which a
new strategy has to be sought. Policy is an all-encompassing word and it is often chaotic.
It varies over the region in terms of the levels of chaos. But it is not necessarily hampering
the grassroots’ transformations. That is why they have a very important focus on
developing a garden of hope, built around best practices. “Within this milieu we had lots
of failures of all sorts: administrative, political, implementation etc.”
He noticed that there are ample examples of best practices within this chaotic milieu and
people are trying to find innovative solutions. The building blocks for the new strategy are
already there on the ground. One of the key proposals has been to establish an ongoing
continuous database on best practices for South Asia as a co-resource for strategising
issues. The issue of best practices is the key element in trying to develop the new strategy.
The Six Major Themes

In terms of strategy they have focused on six major themes. In South Asia, to make dents
on poverty, everyone is realising that the policy world is less than optimal and cannot
afford an encyclopaedic approach to solutions simply because there are no takers for that
and it is totally unrealistic.
Firstly, they have identified the need to focus on the poor, the potential of the poor in
trying to move forward. Secondly, they have reemphasised the idea of prudent macro-
economics. Thirdly, they have laid very strong emphasis on the main theme of
mainstreaming of the informal economy where economists do not focus. The informal
sector can also mean quite smart enterprises. The fourth strategic priority is balancing
gender and other inequalities. Sustainable development issues relating to water, land and
environment etc. are also becoming very important especially within the South Asian
context and these are the fifth strategic priority. The last priority mentioned was that the
potentials of the regional cooperation which remained largely untapped should be

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adequately explored. The SAARC Summit in Islamabad this time has given a hope that a
new reality may be in the offing.
In conclusion, Dr. Zillur observed that ISACPA has projected a set of goals which are
more ambitious than the millennium development goals (MDGs). MDG seeks to halve the
level of poverty by 2015 whereas ISACPA seeks to halve the level of poverty by 2010. He
said the commission is completely convinced that there are more strategic realities which
are not fully reflected in the report.
Presentation by Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui

Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, Government of
Bangladesh and Co-Chair of ISACPA, made a presentation on the implications of the
SAARC summit decision on the recommendations of the ISACPA and follow-up action.
Dr. Siddiqui informed the audience that the Commission met about six times. Its members
have visited many projects and programmes and also spoke to a large number of people.
They have tried to make it as participatory as possible within their means. The SAARC
Secretary General helped a great deal in this regard. That was how the report was
prepared.
Dr. Siddiqui pointed out that he was mandated to present the report before the SAARC
foreign ministers by the members. It was duly presented and approved then and there
without anyone raising any question about it. When the summit began all the leaders were
full of praises in their speeches while approving the report.
Indian Prime Minister Mr. Atul Bihari Vajpayee, surprisingly, came up with the
commitment of US $100 million to implement the recommendations of the report and
made it very clear that the money should be spent in South Asia, but outside India. The
SAARC Secretary General told him that the Government of Pakistan, the World Bank, and
the ADB expressed total commitment to implement the recommendations of the report.
One of the resolutions of the SAARC summit was that ISACPA would be allowed to
continue in an advisory capacity. ISACPA members were requested to visit Kathmandu to
the SAARC Secretary General to attend a meeting, precisely to address these issues. They
preliminarily came to a common understanding that they should go on both at the level of
initiatives and at the policy level. Dr. Siddiqui noted that to begin with, they felt that they
should support the garden of hope that had been identified in the report and that was where

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the initial emphasis should be. There are many projects and programmes in South Asia on
poverty alleviation which are doing extremely well all across the region. Supporting these
programmes could be a good beginning.
In conclusion, Dr. Siddiqui expressed his deep appreciation to the audience and sought
guidance and opinion of the experts from all over South Asia on how ISACPA should go
about supporting those initiatives in implementing the recommendations of the report.
Comments by the Designated Discussants

Dr. Godfrey Gunatilleke
Deputy Chairman, Council of Fellows, Marga Institute, Sri Lanka and Convenor, SACEPS
Task Force on the Citizen’s Social Charter
Focusing on the report, Dr. Gunatilleke observed that it has examined a number of issues
and gone in-depth into the strategy that is being proposed. He was highly interested in the
way Dr. Zillur distinguished between what he called policy-based and initiative-based
approaches. This was an important insight particularly considering the reality that he
observed in South Asia – leadership structures that are weak, policy frameworks which are
constantly contested and are not applied consistently. So, it was difficult to assess the
impact of policies for the reasons that they were not consistently implemented.
Dr. Gunatilleke observed that in that process, we do have the ground level initiatives;
attempt of people to somehow find and develop their own coping strategies to etch out a
better life. This is an extremely interesting approach, but the problem with such an
approach is that it must be complemented. He hoped that the unfinished agenda of the
commission is going to include this. “We might ask why this institutional situation exists
and how we could remedy it. Because there is no gain saying that if we do not provide a
well-defined institutional framework, you are not going to be able to really move forward
very much with these initiatives. They will be confined to the level that they are now.”
Dr. Gunatilleke argued about the reasons behind the slow progress in South Asia. We set
targets, but we have not even achieved half of these. We have different types of poverty.
Do we understand the different nature of poverty as it is in different parts of our countries,
he asked. Citing the example of Sri Lanka for instance, he said the country over the last 50
years has done very well in terms of human poverty; education, health etc. But income
poverty has remained persistent. Is it due to some failures to link growth to poverty
eradication? Is it due to some fundamental problems which are institutional, he
questioned, arguing that such trends persisted in the past because we have confined

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ourselves to initiative-based approaches which may neglect the more fundamental

problems that cause the poverty in our region. This is extremely important. We do not
even have a clear understanding of the profile of poverty in South Asia, he bemoaned,
saying, even in our individual countries we are working on poverty for a long time and
trying to assemble data.
Who are the poor? How many of them are in the informal sector? How many of them are
in other parts of the economy? What is the nature of urban poverty? What is the nature of
rural poverty? Unless, we really apply ourselves consistently to those problems, we are
going to let poverty alleviation depend just on trends. “What has happened in the last 10
years? We have had so many improvements and we went into a change of policy regime.
What has been the impact of that on poverty?”
Linking Poverty to Growth

Dr. Gunatilleke noticed that everyone is talking about poverty reduction which is driven
by the donor community. Sufficient attention has not been paid to the poverty reduction
strategy that has come out of the World Bank. In Sri Lanka, the whole poverty reduction
strategy has come out of formulation of strategies in the last 5/6 years in which the donors
participated a great deal. But on the other hand, subsidies are being reduced and the role of
the state is being squeezed. We are spending a great deal on reducing the budget deficit,
and achieving sound macro-economic fundamentals. But we have few initiatives to link
poverty to growth, he felt.
He surmised that the focus on growth is taking us to a society where there will be a
concentration of both economic and political power and there will be corporate power
which will not be accountable to the society. He said that the first thing we have to ask is
what has been the impact on poverty in the last 10 years as a result of the policy package
that we have implemented.
Accessibility and Accountability

He noted that it is extremely important to make these positive initiatives accessible to the
majority of poor. Major transformations have to be made in the structure and in parliament
and so on.
He indicated that the World Development Report of 2004 is all about improving services
to the poor. The report pointed out that there is no structure of accountability for ensuring
quality service delivery.

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He pointed out that there is no attempt in putting in place structures of rights and
responsibilities in order to achieve poverty eradication. It is an enormous task and to do
that it requires the ability to organise the poor. There is also the need to make them
understand that a particular programme will be carried out in a particular way with
particular targets in mind. There should also be a process where the poor can ask about the
successes or the failures of the programmes under implementation. In case of failures,
government officers could be held accountable for the same, he suggested.
In conclusion, he noted that a process had been developed in Karnataka, the report card
system, which empowered the poor in a very direct way. They can ask for redress if there
is any failure. If there is no structure with accountability, poverty eradication is not
possible, and to have the structure with accountability means a political process that
requires a system in which the civil society can also participate. All these elements are
lacking in our society. Until we can really try and put these into places, poverty
eradication will remain a distant dream.
Dr. Quazi Mesbahuddin Ahmed

Member (GED), Planning Commission
Emphasis on People’s Behavioural Change

Dr. Mesbahuddin Ahmed pointed out that people, especially the women, have been
seeking increased help of physicians in the latter part of 1990s than in the early-90s. This
particular behavioural pattern is driven by the rise in per-capita income. Without any
change in income, behavioural pattern does not change. In Bangladesh, a particular person
in a particular area such as an MP, a UP chairman would like to be the king in their own
areas. It is because of the incentive package that is made available by the government in
that particular area. These are real stories and real situations are often driven by such
incentive packages, he contended.
Issue of Governance
Dr. Mesbahuddin noted that there are many initiatives all around us. Initiatives that are
taken by the people at the grassroots level for poverty alleviation are working well. But
some are also being frustrated due to lack of good governance. People in the slums are
disturbed by the mastans, the local hoodlums and the unruly elements. “What would have
happened if our women could move around freely around Mohakhali area in Dhaka city at
night, and could have opened shops? They have the entrepreneurial capacity to expand

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business within a short time-span. But they cannot keep their shops open till midnight.” In
Thailand, women could move around even at the dead of the night because of good law
and order situation. He indicated that this applies to the urban areas but similar stories are
also applicable in rural areas. Economic and non-economic factors are very much
interlinked. But governance issues are the predominant ones in any grassroots level
initiative for poverty alleviation.
Issue of Garden of Hope

Referring to the gardens of hope, Mesbahuddin felt that most of the happenings are taking
place in India. He underpinned the need to understand why some things have worked out
well in India but not elsewhere in the region.
Issue of Policy Formulation

He noted that the policy recommendations of the ISACPA report did state that we should
start with the past experience of policy formulation and just add some innovative
proposals to go ahead for implementation. In Bangladesh, we are seriously constrained
due to the lack of capacity within the civil bureaucracy and within the public sector
ministries. Those capacities of 1960s, 70s and 80s do not exist anymore. He suggested that
capacity need to be created within the public sector if we are to move forward towards
innovative solutions.
Bangladesh Scenario
Mesbahuddin pointed out the constant advice of the IMF and the WB to prioritise resource
use. In fact, they are doing their best to prioritise resources in a medium-term scenario up
to FY06. But even prioritisation of resources would not give much space for
manoeuvrability in terms of committing resources for poverty alleviation because
resources have already been pre-empted by the existing or ongoing projects. He strongly
felt that political courage is essential to scrub those projects or we will be left with limited
resources, not even 0.5 percent of GDP, for poverty alleviation.
The second thing he mentioned was the shock that is coming Bangladesh’s way with the
phasing out of the Multi-fibre Arrangement (MFA) in January, 2005. “We have put all our
eggs in one basket as far as our export is concerned.” He expressed the hope that
something positive would happen by that time and MFA would be extended probably by a
few more years. If not, he raised questions: “What would happen if the export industry of

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Bangladesh has to survive without any quota? What would then happen to the employment
scenario inside the country, to the total resources, to the external sector of the country?”
Under such circumstances, he felt that the most prudent thing would be to forge greater
collaboration among the SAARC countries. But because of the structure of the economies
of the SAARC countries, it will not be possible to help each other much in terms of
accommodating each others’ exports, he apprehended.
Professor M.M. Akash

Department of Economics, University of Dhaka
Statistical Findings
In his discussion, Professor M.M. Akash emphasised on the key statistics on the economic
and social performance of the SAARC countries as presented at the end of the paper in the
annex table. To him, those are important because those will reveal the differential
performance with respect to growth, poverty, inequality within the region in spite of the
structural constraints.
Referring to Table-1 of page 108 of the paper, where the recent economic growth
performance was reported, he observed that the highest growth occurred in India and Sri
Lanka. Their per capita income grew at 4.1 and 4 percent per annum respectively during
the period 1990-99 whereas in the case of Pakistan it was only 1.3 percent. Bangladesh
had a modest rate of 3.1 percent.
In Table-5 where the decline or increase in the rate of poverty is depicted, we find again
that the performances of India and Sri Lanka were better than other member countries of
the SAARC for the roughly comparable period between the 1980s and late 1990s. India
was able to reduce its rate of poverty by 33 percent while the second performer Sri
Lanka’s poverty rate declined by 16 percent. The table also shows that the picture is most
alarming in the case of Pakistan where poverty increased by 21 percent during the same
period. The poverty rate of Bangladesh had also declined at the rate of 15 percent which
was almost equal to that of Sri Lanka.
However, the picture changes radically if one uses the World Bank definition of absolute
poverty which is $1.0 dollar per-capita per-day for poverty line income. With respect to
that definition the best performer will be Nepal and India will occupy the second position.
But Sri Lanka’s position will change drastically and its rate of poverty will be apparently

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showing an increase by 65 percent according to that definition. But this high rate of
increase is actually due to the low base figure of poverty in Sri Lanka. That is why an
increase from only 4.0 percent to 6.6 percent appeared as a 65 percent increase in the rate
of poverty.
Prof. Akash noted that considering the historically well-known performance of Sri Lanka
in the fields of education and health, perhaps India and Sri Lanka should be considered as
the top two performers in South Asia. Again, under both definitions, Pakistan’s
performance in the field of poverty alleviation was the most disheartening. According to
the World Bank definition it has increased by 167 percent. Bangladesh’s performance was
also not enviable. According to the same definition, the rate of poverty had increased by
2.0 percent during the roughly comparable period of 1989-94 to 1995-97. This is perhaps
due to the choice of the particular time horizon, for Bangladesh since the growth actually
picked up after 1995.
Referring to Table-6 where income and consumption inequality trends were depicted, he
observed that surprisingly in Pakistan the inequality had declined in spite of its relatively
sad performance in the fields of economic growth and poverty reduction. In all other
SAARC countries, income and consumption inequality showed a rising trend, however,
the increase again was the lowest in the case of India and Sri Lanka. Bangladesh was the
third in the line.
With all these statistics, what can be inferred is that the macro performance of India and
Sri Lanka was relatively better than the other SAARC countries. Whatever structural
constraints there may have been, these two countries have performed relatively better
within those constraints. He noted that there is a special need to look at the micro
experience and also the macro-policies of those two countries to see whether they actually
differ from the other countries.
Micro Cases in the Report

Prof. Akash noted that in Chapter-5 of the paper, the best practices of the different
SAARC countries had been described. There were four such case studies from India and a
single broad general observation on Sri Lanka demonstrated extraordinary policies in the
social sectors. It showed common merits of those success stories. He observed that in all
Indian cases, the project had a targeted approach based on affirmative discrimination for
the poor. Indigenous ownership and self-initiative for the poor was the main driving force.

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These projects were not imposed from above, but were initiated from below where the
other agents played a role only as animators. Sri Lanka did not follow the current fashion
of market-driven prioritisation policy in the fields of education and health. And finally,
more or less in all these cases, strong backing and support of the political authority was
there. For example, the SAPAP project in Andhra Pradesh in India was cited as a success
story. The same project was applied in Bangladesh at Kishoreganj, but it failed because
there was not enough political will to support it from the top.
He said the paper in Part-B therefore has rightly given the highest importance in its
strategy for poverty reduction in South Asia to mobilise our own power and initiative.
Charity-driven or top-down projects will never be of much use in sustainable reduction of
poverty. In conclusion, Prof. Akash observed that the paper forgot to mention that the
sufficient condition for sustainable social mobilisation of the poor is the presence of a
favourable political power in the centre.
Ms. Khawar Mumtaz

Coordinator, Shirkat Gah, Lahore and Cooordinator, Citizen’s Social Charter
preparation Task Force, Pakistan
Ms. Mumtaz pointed out that she has been a part of an extensive poverty assessment
exercise in Pakistan, as well as, part of the alternative report in Pakistan produced with the
support of UNDP, on poverty alleviation. Ms. Mumtaz observed that Pakistan has been
going through a particularly bad performance as far as poverty is concerned. A large
portion of population has entered into the poverty cycle in the last 10 years, she said,
adding, poverty which had earlier ranged between 17 and 20 percent has risen to almost 40
percent, which is alarming. The participatory poverty assessment was an exercise to find
out how the poor perceive their poverty, what they see as the real obstacles to poverty
reduction and how they experience poverty at the individual levels. Referring to the
ISACPA report, she said there are very good blueprints and strategies that have been
developed to curb poverty in Pakistan. But they found that such reports never had an
impact because there were many obstacles in the implementation process such as lack of
political will and failure to involve the poor in the process. She noted that the involvement
of the poor means empowerment of the poor. The whole aspect of human poverty,
particularly in Pakistan, relates to poor human resource development. She noted that the
indicators reveal that Pakistan is the poorest in the region in terms education, technical
know-how and other aspects.

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Issue of Social Structure

Ms. Mumtaz pointed out that the poverty assessment was carried out across Pakistan in
over 57 districts, of which, more than one-third were the poorest districts of the country. It
was found that a lot of inequity in the society depended on how the society was structured.
It is the social structures that continue to keep people socially excluded. She observed that
because of the reasons of not owning land and not having any capital, the poor are
excluded and continue to be excluded. Such people neither have access to mainstream
politics nor do they hold decision-making positions. “So the problem is both how we
change the social structure in order to move towards some symbols of equity. Equity is
missing in the society and all the other concomitant problems follow from this.”
Views on Poverty: Policymakers Vs the Poor

Ms. Mumtaz observed that the issue is how the policymakers view poverty and how the
poor perceive it. From the point of view of the policymakers, she said, education receives
the utmost priority. But from the perspective of the poor, health is more important than
education. Because of the absences of skills, the poor mostly rely on their manual physical
capabilities to generate income. She said both the UNDP report as well as the poverty
assessment put health on top of the priority list of the poor. If the poor are physically well,
they can achieve at least some level of food security. The other thing she noted was that in
the absence of capital, the poor rely solely on their physical well being. “It is menial
labour that people rely on unless there are shocks. The poor plunge into poverty much
faster than others. We found that the poverty-plunge was also often linked to death or to
serious illnesses of the main bread-earners.”
She reported that based on the major findings of the poverty assessment on Pakistan there
was a follow-up exercise with a wide range of policymakers including army generals,
political leaders, bureaucrats, trade union leaders, leading educationists etc. participating
in it. Surprisingly, while the poor identified health as a very important issue, health just
did not feature in the priority of the follow-up exercise. “So there is a gap between what
the poor perceive as their priority and what the policymakers decide for the country.”
Impact of Poverty on Women

Ms. Mumtaz observed that what is happening to society is not taken into account in terms
of the impact of poverty on the poor and what it means to different sections of the society.
They found that the whole struggle for livelihood has grown among women in larger

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number than ever before. In rural areas, women have already been a part of the production
process. Without them, the agro-economy would not function at all. In urban areas, the
burden of livelihood and food insecurity is growing. They found that women are not only
doubly burdened but it is more than that. In urban Pakistan, due to lack of growth in
industrial sector, men in huge numbers are unemployed in the cities. Women are
shouldering the burden in the urban areas as a result. They become maids and very poorly
paid informal sector employees in the production process. At home, without a change in
social relationships, they are also regularly exploited in male-dominated societal and
family structures. She noted that there is no attempt to address this issue of the workforce.
Women are now the principal second-earners in most poor households. “But, without the
requisite power of decision-making they have no control over what they are or earn.”
Sustainable Development
She observed that the cause of sustainable development is challenged immediately by the
development policies that the government itself promotes or supports. For instance, in
Pakistan, new canals, big dams which destroy not only people’s livelihood but also the
environment, are big issues. She indicated that there is a huge conflict between practice
and reality in her society at the policy levels. “Unless we really move towards empowering
the poor and unless the issue of the social structure and the wide gap between those who
have and have-not are addressed, the problem will exist.”
Issue of Land Reform

Ms. Mumtaz reported that in Pakistan one of the biggest issues the poor talk about is land
ownership in the rural areas. Even if it is a small piece of land, it gives them a sense of
security. She observed that the economy is run by those who are powerful locally or
politically and the poor are increasingly being pushed to the margins of the society. She
felt that there is a need for a legislation to make sure that inequity in terms of land
ownership is reduced. She pointed out that in Pakistan there had been no serious land
reform and redistribution of land and assets.
In conclusion, she observed that law and order, child labour, development of peoples’
skills and accessibility to income and resources are issues that also need to be addressed.
She noted that it is not possible to remove poverty without bringing about fundamental
strategic changes.

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Floor Discussion
Dr Kamal Uddin Siddiqui
Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, Government of Bangladesh and Co-Chair of
ISACPA
Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui found three models of poverty reduction in South Asia – the
Indian model, the donor-driven one and the third model developing in Bangladesh.
He observed that Bangladesh is in the process of preparing the PRSP. The government has
decided to share all the information with donors and interact with them. But the
government will be in the driving seat. There will be a wide range of consultations with all
the stakeholders and it will be carried out on a regional and national basis. No
international consultant will be employed. Local consultants working in the Bangladesh
Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) are taking the leading role. Money will not be
sought from the donors in preparing the PRSP. The main four cross-cutting issues will be
gender sensitivity, pro-poor growth, governance and sustainable development. It will also
take into consideration the two SAARC Poverty Commission reports because those are
very relevant. “We are trying to develop a very home-grown PRSP,” he claimed.
Another point Dr. Siddiqui made was about the SAPAP Project, “It was very successful in
Andhra Pradesh. As ISACPA went there, we had significant exchanges with them.” But
SAPAP failed in Kishoregonj not because of lack of political will. It started when the last
BNP government was towards the end and was carried forward during the next Awami
League government. But he noted that its failure was due to wrong targeting. “It was not
targeted to the poor; it was targeted to the entire population. As it happens in such a
situation, the advantages are reaped by the more powerful.”
Dr G.S. Bhalla
Professor, Emeritus, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India
To begin with Dr. Bhalla observed that in the entire subcontinent agriculture still occupies
a very important role. It is agricultural growth and the growth of labour which is primarily
instrumental in reducing rural poverty. He felt that there is a need to look into the
constraints in the growth of agriculture within the region. He raised the question: “Why is
it not growing and where are the initiatives which can be effective in removing those
constraints and at what level?”

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Constraints to Agricultural Growth

a. Institutional Constraints
Dr. Bhalla observed that the major constraints in agriculture are either institutional or
infrastructural. The institutional constraints relate to land reform. To what extent land
reforms take place in any particular country determines the extent of basic institutional
constraints to the growth of agriculture that have to be removed. He noted that one of the
greater contributions is the extent to which civil society initiatives are undertaken in
strengthening the movement towards bringing about land reforms.
b. Infrastructural Constraints
The second major constraint which he noticed especially after the globalisation process
started is lack of infrastructural and public investment. He pointed out that infrastructural
investment has decelerated, especially, rural infrastructural investment all over the
subcontinent. This was responsible for retardation of agricultural growth.
He observed that one of the infrastructural constraints can be removed if micro credit can
be made available. He felt that the basic infrastructural constraints have to be removed
through the intervention of critical parties such as the governments. He indicated that it is
the government which is to mobilise the resources for huge public investment. “The extent
to which the civil society can mobilise people so the governments in the region are
compelled to give priority to public investment in agriculture will be important.”
Issue of Non-farm Sector

Dr. Bhalla pointed out that the growth of the non-farm sector which is related to poverty is
very important. But the relationship of the non-farm sector is also primarily linked to the
agricultural sector in the rural areas and that relationship is also crucial. He indicated
certain sectors of the economy in Bangladesh, which need not necessarily be linked to
agriculture, for example, the garments industry, where there is stronger export possibility.
But, unless the linkages are very high, the export benefits will be confined only to a
smaller sector. He felt that its benefits will not be spread as much as in the case of
agriculture related activities.
Mr. Muhammad Zamir

Former Ambassador
Mr. Zamir started by pointing out that instead of having poverty alleviation as a topic, it
should have been termed as poverty reduction. That has a basic philosophical implication

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which is important for all to perceive. The reason is that every single word in English like
any other language has a denotation and a connotation and unless we get our connotation
right, we cannot move forward. In the context of participatory poverty management, in
order to be able to move forward in poverty eradication, we have to take into context some
of the elemental aspects of social life in the South Asian region which needs to be
addressed primarily to understand what the problem is and then move accordingly.
Issue of Governance
He observed that we have in South Asia, a range of alternative formats of democracy. This
is affecting the overall approach to poverty reduction. There is consequentially a chain
reaction which leads to lack of transparency in decision-making and policy formulation.
Lack of accountability eventually leads to corruption. We therefore, have to take into
account the institutional approach rather than just the politicisation of governance. We also
have to examine the criminalisation of politics and the need for removing the nexus
between the defaulters in governance and the political leadership which has also not been
addressed, he said, adding, all these factors combine to create a lack of confidence in the
people in South Asia on their rulers.
Mr. Waliur Rahman

Director, Bangladesh Institute of Law and International Affairs (BILLA), Former
Ambassador
Issue of Setting Target

Mr. Rahman observed that the intention for halving poverty by 2010 or halving the
number of people without access to safe drinking water and sanitation by 2010 was
meritorious. However, there are grounds for scepticism since we have been setting targets
for Bangladesh and the South Asian countries since long. Except for India and Sri Lanka
and to some extent Bangladesh, we have not been able to reach any of the targets we had
set.
Issue of Governance
Mr. Rahman noted that the question of governance has been rather half-heartedly
addressed in the report. But in South Asia, we do not see harmonisation of policies of the
governing elites of various countries. Thus, anything that has been done by a government
is likely to be neglected or put to the sidelines by the succeeding government.

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Issue of Agriculture
He agreed that agriculture is still contributing a major share to the GDP of Bangladesh but
the vast majority of the farmers, who are actually contributing the bulk share of the GDP
in Bangladesh, are the most neglected people in this country. If the farmers are
contributing most of the GDP to Bangladesh then why cannot we address their needs by
supplying the inputs that they need from time to time in a more coordinated manner, he
asked.
Mr. M. Syeduzzaman
Member, CPD Board of Trustees and Chairman, Bank Asia
Policy versus Initiative

Mr. M. Syeduzzaman observed that it is a very interesting diagnosis by the commission
that poverty reduction in East Asia and South East Asian regions has been driven by
policies, whereas, in South Asia it is driven by initiatives. It will be useful if the
commission in its future work makes an attempt to establish a link between policies and
initiatives. Initiatives can thrive in a congenial policy environment. If we look at the
national policies, it is not difficult to find that these policies are the results of certain
international initiatives. The poverty reduction strategy that most countries follow these
days is: high investment, high growth and investment in the social sector. But these have
come out of several international initiatives in the late 1980s and 1990s like the
Copenhagen Social Summit, Rio Environmental Summit, The Women’s Summit in
Beijing, and the Population Summit in Cairo; which really helped to formulate national
policies. Similarly, it will be interesting to see and examine the commission’s future work
to observe whether initiatives can be reflected gradually into national policies or not.
Dr Rushidan Islam Rahman

Research Director, BIDS
Dr. Rushidan observed that land reform is not only about agricultural land but also about
homestead property. For the very poor, homestead land is the home itself. It is not only a
place to live but it is a productive asset for them. The recent schemes of housing ought to
think of giving access to homestead land which can give a big boost to the productive
capacity of the household.

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Issue of Non-farm Sector

Some of her recent analysis has shown that the non-farm sectors both in rural and urban
areas have larger poverty alleviating capacity. But in this respect, she was slightly
surprised by the fact that within the non-farm sector, the manufacturing sector did not
perform that well especially in the rural area, which means that people are mostly
engaging in low productive manufacturing activities. Whereas, other activities such as
construction, trading could give better returns.
Issue of Inequality
Dr. Rushidan indicated that in the olden times inequality was the central theme when
people talked about deprivation. “We have lost the real emphasis on inequality may be
because it is conceptually difficult to handle the issue of inequality and on the policy front
it is more difficult to adopt policies for reduction of inequality.” Reduction of inequality
can have a much larger impact and it can enhance the impact of growth. Instead of talking
about inequality, the discussion on pro-poor growth has been initiated which is to some
extent a substitute of the notion of inequality. But it cannot be a total substitute because of
increasing inequality in the urban areas. Urbanisation is said to have helped poverty
reduction but the impact was not as large as it could be. It is not urbanisation which
provides the causal link. It is the activities that are organised in the urban centres which
help poverty alleviation. Urbanisation grows in Bangladesh when certain centres of
activities experience growth in their non-farm component. When the population density is
above a certain level, it is automatically defined as urban area. That is how urbanisation is
linked with poverty alleviation.
Issue of Safety-net
The ISACPA agenda which was presented for poverty alleviation has one omission which
relates to the safety net. This should have come as an explicit agenda on the list but was
unfortunately not there. As we all know, the extent of poverty depends on the balance of
two forces – downward mobility which is due to various types of disasters, both natural
and man-made, and upward mobility. To reduce downward mobility one has to carefully
plan the safety net agenda so that it can help prevent the downward mobility which can
take the form of losing of earning members, health problems as well as natural disasters
which affect current income and productive assets. So, safety net must be given an explicit
role in this agenda.

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Gender Issues
South Asian society is unfair to those women who are prepared to work hard for long
hours at low wages, but are still not getting enough employment opportunities. This issue
needs much more emphasis than it has so far received.
Ms Khushi Kabir
Coordinator, Nijera Kori
Issue of Implementation
Focusing on the issue of implementation, Khushi Kabir said, “We are talking of pro-poor
approaches, participation and sustainability. The whole question again is who decides on
implementation of policies and who decides on the monitoring that the implementation is
actually taking place.”
Issue of Initiatives
She noticed that the problem often lies in the fact that initiatives have been taken and
replicated but the replication is never the same as the original because not enough
emphasis has been given to find out what were the factors that enabled the original
initiative to succeed.
She pointed out that there has been some talk about food security and peoples’ rights. It is
important to look at the non-farm employment opportunities but not at the cost of reducing
the importance of agriculture. After all, food security depends on the production of food
within the country.

Land reform is not an old fashioned agenda though there is a tendency to forget it and give
more importance to other issues. We need to look at all aspects of such reform in order to
attain total reduction of poverty.
Mr Sayed Alamgir Farrouk Chowdhury

Former Secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare
Regarding agriculture, Mr. Farrouk noted that large subsidies are given in the developed
countries to agriculture which amount to more than US$350 billion annually. There are
problems in subsidising agriculture in terms of fertiliser prices. It needs to be examined

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whether the price support being given by the governments of South Asia really trickles
down to the farmers.
Prioritising Resources
He noticed that there is considerable scope for provisioning more resources to all the
programmes that impact poverty. Sometimes, it is suggested that there is lack of resources.
Reviewing the annual development programme and the budget, it becomes clear that there
is still considerable scope for channelling resources from programmes of lower importance
to more urgent priorities such as poverty alleviation.
Issue of Globalisation
The future work of ISACPA should also contain a little more on globalisation and on
international trade and inter-regional impact on poverty alleviation.
Mr. S.M. Al-Husainy

Former Chairman, PSC and Chairman, Swanirvar Bangladesh
Mr. Al-Husainy noted that the commission has been more ambitious than the MDG as in
the case of access to primary education. But access to primary education does not only
mean enrolment but also completion. Most of the countries in the region have attained
these targets, but we now need to address the question of quality and reducing the drop out
rates because education is the key to reducing poverty.
Institutional Requirements
Working in the field, he found that income alone or training in skill development or
talking about health through a target-group approach does not reduce poverty. All these
efforts have to be integrated. Swanirvar Bangladesh has been trying to implement the total
village development programme. The government has started the grassroots gram sarker
programme but it does have the possibility of integration. Literacy is there, but the
provision for vocational education and skill development must also be there. Programmes
for health, nutrition, family planning and the environment need to be integrated. This
process also requires the integration of various interest groups in the village. “We have
been talking about the village power structure which stops development where the
educated do not want others to become educated and become their equal; the wealthy
farmer does not want that person who is working in his field to become his equal.” In such
stratified societies how to bring different groups together is a major concern, he

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categorically said. The approach of gram sarker has some potential if it is not used
politically and if used only for rural grassroots development.
Micro Enterprises
He observed that the agriculture-dependent rural industry needs to be supported. It should
start with micro enterprises and then from there go into small and medium enterprise
development. If the security of the poor people regarding borrowing money, use of
technology and management can be established, then it will be possible for them to
employ other people. Emphasis should be on agricultural support and processing of
agricultural products and from there move to increased mechanisation. Industry is the only
sector of the economy, in the context of Bangladesh, which remains very stagnant. In
order to get out of that stagnancy, we have to focus on how to graduate using the
foundations of micro enterprises to develop them into small and medium enterprises.
Mr. M. M. Rezaul Karim

Member, Advisory Committee, Bangladesh Nationalist Party
Mobilising Power of the Poor

Mr. Rezaul Karim observed that whatever poverty reduction takes place is really marginal.
In some places, it had done well, while in other places it had done not so well. But the
people have remained poor. In Bangladesh, particularly in areas such as the south-western
part, in villages there have been tortures and repressions on the people by various armed
insurgent groups. This tendency is not only confined to the south-western region of
Bangladesh but it is also pervasive in West Bengal in India. In West Bengal, those
inequities that exist among various classes of society have continued to increase. The
amount of violence that is taking place in West Bengal is possibly more than what is
recorded in Bangladesh. “History teaches us that when peoples’ backs are pushed against
the wall, they would do anything and there could be a revolution. We have to take
measures which will be effective in reducing poverty. This should not only come from the
government and from the top, but also from the bottom.”
Dr Hameeda Hossain
Director, Ain-O-Shalish Kendra (ASK)
Dr. Hameeda indicated that everybody referred to reform of agricultural land. It is equally
important to consider reform or land sales in urban areas. A closer look at the master plans

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of all the cities in Bangladesh will reveal that absolutely no space is allowed for the hard
working poor. As a result, they take their own initiatives and live in slums. It has been
noticed that in the last few years in Bangladesh most of the slum dwellers have been
evicted mostly through illegal means. This has happened despite the fact that Bangladesh
has a Housing Policy that made international commitments and it has received orders from
the court not to evict slum dwellers without providing them with any alternative
settlement.
Issue of Trafficking
She observed that the commission has set elimination of all forms of trafficking as a co-
objective which is an unrealistic target because trafficking is a form of movement. It is not
just trafficking of women or children or men through illegal means but one should also
look at freedom of movement particularly of labours. The SAARC convention on
trafficking has only looked at the criminal aspects of trafficking. One has to go much
deeper into the social and political imbalances of power within the family and within the
community which makes it possible. “So, we really need to look first at how to redress the
imbalances either through legal reforms or social changes in customary ways. Also if men,
women and children want to go across the river and find employment, either seasonal or
permanent, then one needs to look at the possibilities of allowing them freedom of
movement, allowing a system of work permits and so on, so that they can move from one
country to another.”
Issue of Initiatives
Dr. Hameeda suggested that initiatives are also possible within a policy framework that
encourages initiatives. In Bangladesh, lots of initiatives are being taken. When people are
taking initiatives for income generation the obstructions are coming from the extortionists
who are being backed by the political system. When women are taking initiatives, the
obstructions are coming from Imams or religious leaders, who are issuing ‘fatwa’ or
injunctions. “These ‘fatwa’-givers are perpetrating because law is not enforced against
their illegal injunctions,” she said. The government is funding Madrashas and that is a
source for their end products. She felt that we need to take a closer look into the whole
policy framework, the social environment and how the government is encouraging a
certain social environment which is leading to the obstruction of private initiatives

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Mr. S.M. Mayeen Ahmed

Executive Director, SARRV
Issue of the Disabled

Mr. Mayeen Ahmed observed that decisions have been made regarding education without
considering how students with disability can come into the picture. For this purpose, a
stipend should be made available. Then they will also come to the school and it will
encourage their parents to send their children to educational institutions.
“I am working with people with disabilities. My colleagues come from different parts of
Dhaka city. Very recently, pedal-rickshaws have been withdrawn from particular city
areas. I am not for manual labour but at the same time by withdrawing rickshaws without
putting into place any alternative public transport, we are just obstructing people with
disabilities to participate in their daily activities,” he said.
He pointed out that there has been approval of plans for the entire infrastructure without
considering the architectural barriers posed to the enormous number of people with
disability. Sometimes, they are not allowed into the schools, only because the teachers are
not willing to help them climb up the stairs of the school floors.
Ms Rasheda K. Chowdhury
Director, CAMPE
Issue of Primary Education

Ms. Rasheda Chowdhury felt that there has been talk since the 1970s about greater access
to primary education. Now, the time has come to talk about universal completion of
primary education. Just creating access is not enough because in South Asia except for Sri
Lanka and Maldives 30 to 40 percent people drop-out even if they have access to
education. In South Asia, the recent statistics show that 45 percent of the total illiterates of
the global community belong to South Asia, and the rest are in Sub-Saharan-Africa and in
Latin America. The other concerns besides universal completions are: what are they
learning, the performances of the children who are coming out of the primary cycle, which
is the quality divide now. Some people are getting access to quality education, while most
are being deprived of it. There should be a specific target for giving people access to
quality education and completion.

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Rules and Responsibilities of the Stakeholders

Rasheda pointed out that nobody wants the state to shift its responsibility of educating
people. Throughout South Asia, education is becoming more of a market commodity than
a right itself. The rules and responsibilities of the primary stakeholders, particularly the
government, should be identified regarding poverty alleviation. The state should ensure
the access to quality primary education to all. There is intolerance towards the watchdog
roles of civil society groups, political intolerance, and intolerance among in vested interest
groups. If the rules and responsibilities of stakeholders remain unidentified, then we would
get nowhere. The civil society groups should play a more active watchdog role in bringing
about transparency in these issues and other concerns that are affecting the region’s
development.
Issue of the Disabled

In South Asia, disability is still regarded as a matter of social welfare. It is unfortunate that
in Bangladesh, education of the disabled is under the Ministry of Social Welfare whereas
it should be under the Ministry of Education or Ministry of Primary and Mass Education.
Ten percent of the total population in Bangladesh is disabled and 60 percent of them
belong to the mainstream, according to the statistics of Institute of Education and
Research, University of Dhaka.
Dr Sheikh Maqsood Ali

Former Member, Planning Commission and First Poverty Commission
Issue of Harmonisation
Dr. Maqsood Ali pointed out that in order to reduce poverty, it should go through the
market and harmonisation should be achieved between the structural adjustment and
mobilisation process. The members of the first SAARC poverty commission had
approached the donors with the harmonisation technique and wanted to open a new front.
They did not want to challenge what the donors were doing except for trying to harmonise
that front. They made suggestions after suggestions in all the SAARC countries. They
looked to India for the leadership to go for a second front. “But somehow, all the
governments changed. The initiative that was coming from the ground was coming
independently of policy regimes so it was not difficult to stop such initiatives. They
thought that the governments would have to take a very big decision whether they can
ignore such advice or not.”

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Right of the Poor to Resources and Information

The first Commission thought that the right of the poor to resources and information was
most critical. They emphasised that the whole political leadership will have to recognise
clearly that the poor are efficient. They have the right to resources if they are efficient. If
economics is all about allocation of resources in favour of efficiency, then the poor have a
very strong case. The micro-credit experience shows that the poor are more efficient than
the non-poor in utilising the resources which they access.
Issue of Governance
Another area where they tried to move was participatory governance. They thought good
governance also has to be participatory in nature and it will have to be built up from the
grassroots. “Imagine what could happen if we go for a pro-poor plan which supports the
initiative that comes from the ground and try to give it policy support as far as possible
that is backed by their right to resources, information, participatory governance,” he asked.
A political process through which the poor can represent themselves should be promoted.
Dr Rezaul Haq Knandker

Former Advisor, UNDP, New York
Human Status of the Poor

Dr. Khandker observed that there is no improvement in the human status of the poor.
There is no improvement in the way they are treated by those who are non-poor. “I have a
project in Sonargaon. So, I can see that the poor of today may be a little less poor than
they were a few years ago. But they are not better treated in any way by the others.” If
poverty alleviation is restricted only to its material aspects and completely ignores the
aspect of human side, then the situation will not change. This issue should be reflected in
the policy and strategies.
Ms Nasreen Awal Mintoo

President, Women Entrepreneur’s Association of Bangladesh
Development of Women
Focusing on the development of women, Ms. Nasreen observed that in Bangladesh 50
percent of the population are women. She focused on the constraints of female
development, especially in respect to accessing bank loans. “It is really difficult to get the
loan when a woman entrepreneur approaches a bank. Sometimes, it is even difficult for
them to reach the relevant person. One has to knock a couple of times and make pay-offs

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here and there. There is also huge paperwork involved.” For the Small and Medium
Entrepreneurs it is particularly difficult to get a bank loan.
Ms. Nasreen specified the need for a training programme for the Small and Medium
entrepreneurs. She expressed her concerns about the garment workers particularly the
women after MFA phase out. One suggestion was made from their association that if there
is a training programme such as nursing then it will be possible to send them abroad
because there is crisis of nurses in developed world. The women workers can also be
absorbed if the agro processing sector is expanded.
Ms. Khawar Mumtaz
Coordinator, Shirkat Gah, lahore and Cooordinator, Citizen’s Social Charter preparation
Task Force, Pakistan
Harmonious Relationship within Region
Ms. Mumtaz felt that there should be more focus on the harmonious relations and
cooperation among the countries in the region. She suggested that the states of the region
have to take initiatives to harmonise their different expenditures in the region. If all that
money could be released together it would contribute to a great deal towards removing
poverty in the region.
Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahman

Executive Chairman, Power and Participation Research Centre (PPRC) and Member,
ISACPA
Lack of Attention to Issues on Policy

Dr. Zillur pointed out that there is a need to change the perception that policy is to be
ignored. He felt that there is a repository of energy at the grassroots level and it must be
identified as the key resource on which to build strategies and then to implement those
through effective policy measures.
He observed that one could think of a situation where policymaking assumes that the
policymaker is an uninformed person. Therefore, to provide him with information
becomes the objective of policy advice. That is one model. He felt that perhaps in the
West that is the main idea around which they try to build policies. He pointed out that in
the South Asian reality, the assumption of an uninformed policymaker is in all probability
superseded by a worst situation of an uninterested policymaker. “How do you make a
strategy in such an area where the policy audience may not be there for you to start with?”
He indicated that if we make the characteristics of the policy audience itself an

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endogenous variable in our strategy making, then we have to put our focus on another
quality in our discourses which is political intelligence. More intelligence is required for
construction of messages so that it could be delivered at different points. Policy windows
can be opened at all levels.
Database on Best Practices

Referring to the report, Dr. Zillur observed that in the chapter on garden of hope, it has
tried to give some examples. Each country within the region was asked to provide some
examples and they have put it into a framework. He felt that the suggestion is that we need
a South Asian database and the construction of the database has to be through certain
processes. “It cannot be that some organisation says that they constitute the best practice
and therefore we have a full description of that organisation.” He noted that it needs to be
identified what made it best practices. He mentioned that the garden of hope is basically a
suggestion that we need to set up a South Asian steering committee of some sort which
also provides the technical certification for best practices.
Dr. Zillur observed that agriculture is very important and it could well have been featured
in the strategic priorities. In Bangladesh, he indicated, if we look at the 1990s growth
record, one very important finding is that two-thirds of the incremental growth of the
1990s came essentially from the domestic sector. There is a big policy message about
focus on export versus the domestic sector. He pointed out that there is a rural economy
struggling to get itself out. It has done so in 1990s and that is where most of the growth
has taken place while policymakers have been focusing on the urban areas. And the
stimulus for that has essentially come from agricultural income growth and remittance.
These were the two primary drivers for growth in Bangladesh. “It is important for us to
raise that issue in a new language so that it captures the attention of the audiences. There is
a challenge here to bring it up in a language that would attract today’s policy audience.”
Remarks by Professor Rehman Sobhan

Executive Director, SACEPS, Chairman, Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD)
Professor Rehman Sobhan made a few remarks, which the Chairman of ISACPA in
particular, could carry with him to Kathmandu and Delhi and beyond. Firstly, he pointed
out that the reports on poverty alleviation or eradication at the regional level have certain

SACEPS Paper 6
inherent weaknesses. He felt that in the final analysis the alleviation and/or eradication of
poverty is essentially a national agenda derived from the internal dynamics of particular
countries. He pointed out that to put a lot of time and energy into developing a regional
report which can only be implemented at the national level has certain inherent limitations.
“If we go around spending a great deal of time and energy fine-tuning what are going to be
national agendas, it will not be a very productive use of time which has a high opportunity
cost.”
Secondly, he mentioned that at the regional level what may be done is to apply our mind to
developing a more creative macroeconomic policy paradigm for the region which is
specific to the unique circumstances of the region. He argued that all the countries of the
region are still slaves to the Washington Consensus-driven structural adjustment reforms
which were really developed in the 1980s. “That we should be perpetuating the imbecility
of trying to faithfully adhere to these reforms in 2004 demonstrates a certain poverty of
thinking rather than a poverty of income in our part of the world,” he bluntly put it.
He mentioned that they are still telling us that if imports are liberalised, economy is
privatised and agriculture is de-subsidised that will lead to growth. Actually, it has not
done so because conceptually no causality has been established between these steps and
that is a fundamental theoretical weakness in the macroeconomic model of the WB and the
IMF. “But we have adhered to this model and we go on stripping jobs in public sector and
in the liberalised private sector. Somehow, we tend to believe that this is going to
contribute significantly in poverty reduction.”
He indicated that in order to make a creative input collectively, we can certainly try to
develop a more contemporary and relevant macroeconomics which is appropriate and
consistent with the reduction of poverty. Politicians and voters are very conscious about
this problem and this is not only so in our region but also in Latin America where
governments are being overturned left and right. There had already been a crisis in East
Asia built around such developments. He raised questions as to how come South Asia
remained the only captive of the Washington Consensus. This is something that needs to
be urgently addressed.
Prof. Sobhan indicated that there should have been a follow-up section on the chapter: the
garden of hope. Then the specific lessons could have been conceptualised and replicated
so that people could be taken around the garden and told about the lessons learned. “One

SACEPS Paper 6
prospective gardener was telling us that the greatest success story of the region was that
the micro credit is managed by ‘Kabuliwallahs’. So, what lessons are we supposed to
derive from this? Do the governments of the day think that micro credit success stories are
really rapacious ventures to exploit the poor or a replicable lesson that should be shared
around the region?”
Lastly, referring to the operational recommendations in Chapter-9 and the matrix which is
developed with time tables, he suggested that the Commission would quite usefully try to
prune that and see the relevant interventions at the regional level which the Commission is
in a position to pursue as a regional body. He raised certain questions as to what are the
operational initiatives that the Commission as a regional body can carry forward. What is
the Commission doing to concretely assess if the collectivity of the SAARC Secretariat
and regional entities is becoming relevant for the purposes of alleviating poverty. He
suggested that operationally, if the Commission wants to do something, these are some
issues it may concentrate on.
Concluding Remarks by the Chair of the Session

Prof. Muchkund Dubey, President, Council for Social Development and Former Foreign
Secretary, Government of India, in the concluding address of the session, made some
comments derived from his knowledge and experience of what had been done in India for
poverty alleviation and working closely with the civil society organisations and experts in
this field.
Role of Supreme Court in Poverty Alleviation

Prof. Dubey pointed out that in India the rights approach to deal with poverty has become
very prominent. That has been possible because of the Supreme Court’s interpretation of
some of the rights in the directive principles of the State Policy chapter of the Indian
Constitution. In terms of the Fundamental Rights chapter, the right to education, health
and food have by the interpretation of the Supreme Court been made a part of the right to
life that is an enforceable right under the Fundamental Rights provision of the constitution.
And increasingly those groups directly affected by poverty as well as those working for
them are involving the court in enforcing this right. The court itself has taken initiatives in
this regard. The court has virtually appointed two Commissioners to report to it on the
starvation situation, one for South India and another for North India and the
commissioners have appointed their representatives at state levels. There is now an

SACEPS Paper 6
institutional set up going down to the state level at the disposal of the court to report on the
right to food. This is quite a remarkable extension of the effort to deal with the poverty
related problems.
Issue of Governance
Prof. Dubey indicated that governance affects poverty in two ways of which one is
corruption. He mentioned that India runs, perhaps, the largest antipoverty programme in
the world. Annual expenditures on the programme range from about 15,000 to 20,000
crores per annum. This can make a visible impact on the macroeconomic indicators and in
some respect it has. But it has not done so optimally because a very large part of these
resources just do not reach the poor due to corruption. This is how corruption is a big
handicap in the anti-poverty programmes. The second problem is the law and order
situation which are very acute in some parts of India. “It makes it difficult to organise anti-
poverty programmes in some parts of our country and as well as elsewhere.”
He noted that another point about governance is that a part of these problems can be
mitigated if the anti-poverty programme is put entirely at the disposal of the Panchaitee
Raj institutions. “We have the 93rd and 94th amendments to the Constitution where such
devolution has now been made compulsory. Because of the pressure of the Supreme Court
every state has held Panchaitee Raj elections, except for one, which is the state of
Jharkhand.” However, there are many other steps to be taken for implementation. He
reported that in India there was a complete revolution in the organisation of local
government as a result of the constitutional amendment but they still have not been able to
progress very far.
Donor-driven Approach to Poverty

Prof. Dubey reported that the NGOs in India have found a lot of contradictions in the way
the IMF, the WB and the donor countries implement their poverty reduction programmes.
While the governments are organising the poor, they are also basically transgressing the
jurisdiction of the local government and thereby creating a massive problem in the country
as a whole. It is because of their dependent way of organising the poor and not integrating
the programmes totally with the Panchaite Raj institutions. He noted that the government
has an integrated comprehensive approach of which education is a very important part.
But he felt that donors’ entire notion of education is based on commoditisation of

SACEPS Paper 6
education as distinct from emphasising it as a right, as a privilege, as an aspect of human

dignity.
Policy versus Initiatives

Prof. Dubey pointed out that there are some lessons to derive from the fantastic record of
the Far Eastern countries in reducing poverty. In a decade-and-a-half all of them reduced
poverty from the level of say 50-70 percent to 10-20 percent. In South Korea, it is now 0-5
percent, in China it is about 10-12 percent, in most other South East Asian countries it is
15 percent or so. These outcomes provide a good example of what a proper mix of policies
can do rather than just depending on initiatives. These countries thus managed a policy-
induced poverty reduction. The most important element of this policy was the universality
of primary education.
Issue of MFA Phase Out

Prof. Dubey suggested that the disappearance of the MFA requires mutual cooperation
which may assume two or three forms. One is opening up the larger market of India which
can reduce the adverse impact of the instability of the external sector. He noted the
supreme importance of bilateral free trade agreements and regional free trade agreements.
The other thing he pointed out is the advantage of promoting horizontal and vertical
integration in some of the industries, particularly textiles, where we can have a mutual
agreement in areas where we have our strong points and can help each other.
Resources for Poverty Alleviation

He reported that to realise the MDGs for poverty reduction, the WB has calculated that it
requires US$30 to $50 billion per annum. He pointed out that President Lula has taken the
initiative recently for getting a fund created and India’s contribution of a $100 million in
the SAARC context was a very modest contribution. He also noted that the Indian group
has taken the position that so far as funding of resources for poverty alleviation is
concerned, it should not be related to GNP and will need to guarantee the minimum
amount for avoiding hunger among each of the vulnerable groups which are affected by
hunger and poverty. He felt that there are enough resources in each of the SAARC
countries to take care of that need and all it requires is just to prioritise resources to
achieve this goal.

SACEPS Paper 6
Right of the Poor to Resources and Information

Prof. Dubey mentioned that they have made a lot of progress in the area of ensuring right
to information in India which is a very important aspect of poverty alleviation. He reported
that a large number of Indian states have enacted legislations in this regard and the central
government is under pressure to enact a similar legislation.
Human Status of the Poor

He observed that the only way the human status of the poor can be ensured is by adhering
to a right approach to poverty alleviation. We have to organise the poor to assert their
rights and ensure direct involvement of the poor in determining poverty alleviation
programmes. He felt in that way their human status will increase along with the increase in
the index of poverty alleviation.

SACEPS Paper 6
Annex A
Report of the
Independent South Asian Commission
on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA)
Executive Summary
1. Introduction
South Asia has made important gains in its fight against poverty. Notwithstanding some
area-specific progresses, however, total freedom from the poverty trap remains by current
trends a distant goal: the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the number of
poor by 2015 can only be reached by 2025. While the statistics may look frightening, there
is hope and optimism in a new ground reality being forged, a reality of initiatives by
countless men and women across the countries of South Asia and their increasing refusal
to remain content with the vagaries of a poverty-laden fate. While nurturing healthy
livelihood dreams, the poor of the region have already embraced the possibility of a
poverty-free South Asia. If the nucleus of this popular energy can fuse with a new level of
political determination, a goal which may appear over-ambitious by today’s statistics and
standards can quickly translate into reality tomorrow.
Getting serious on a poverty-free South Asia requires, however, a hard-headed assessment

as to how far South Asian countries have come on the poverty front and how far they need
to go. It also requires a sharper engagement with issues of implementation.
2. A Poverty Balance-sheet
Countries of South Asia face new global realities which carry both opportunities and risks.
The region’s export as a share of global trade has increased but only to the very modest
level of 0.9 percent. South Asia’s share in the burgeoning FDI into developing countries
remains virtually unchanged. SAARC countries have been more successful in accessing
overseas employment: India and Bangladesh are in the top 10 recipients of workers’
remittances while the other countries too have not lagged far behind. While telephone
mainlines per 1000 people has more than tripled in the region between 1985 and 2000,
South Asia, home to 23 percent of world’s population, still has less than 1.0 percent of
internet users. GDP growth of South Asia on an average was higher than the average of
developing countries and poverty has declined both in terms of depth and severity, but the
rate of decline has been modest and disparity has persisted. Rising inequalities have
fuelled social conflicts. Though the human development index (HDI) has improved at a

SACEPS Paper 6
rate higher than the average for developing countries, the level remains quite low. Clearly,
greater economic integration into the world economy has yet to translate into sustained
growth for the majority of South Asian countries. Regional economic opportunities which
are enormous remain largely unexploited.
The current status of dollar-a-day poverty incidence in South Asia is around 37 percent but
with large variations across the region. Only sub-Saharan Africa compares to such a
poverty level; East Asia, Pacific, Latin American and the Caribbean have poverty rates in
the region of 15 percent. In terms of national poverty incidence, the poverty rate showed
decline to a varying degree in Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka and increase in
Pakistan over the 1990s. However, income inequality is a rising concern for much of the
region: the ratio of income share of the richest 20 percent to that of poorest 20 percent has
varied from 4 in Bangladesh to 5 in India.
Income is not the measure of poverty. Net primary education enrolment ratio in South
Asia averaged at 77 percent in 1997 compared to 64 percent in 1980 indicating a below
one percent annual rate of increase. However, there are wide variations across countries:
Sri Lanka and Maldives have attained near-universality on this indicator. Adult literacy
rate in 2000 for South Asia as a whole was 55.6 percent indicating that 44 out of 100
South Asian adults are illiterate.
South Asia has shown better progress in under-5 mortality rate, from 148 to 94 deaths per
1000 births in 2000, a drop of 54 deaths per 1000 births in a span of 10 years. There are,
however, large variations across the region, from a low of 19 deaths per 1000 births in Sri
Lanka to 110 deaths per 1000 births in Pakistan. The rate of progress has been much faster
for Bangladesh and Nepal compared to India and Pakistan. Infant mortality rate too
declined from 97 in 1990 to 68 deaths per 1000 births in 2000. On this indicator too,
Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal made faster progress than India and Pakistan while Sri
Lanka enjoys a significantly better rate of only 17 deaths per 1000 births. Data on
maternal mortality are scarcely available. However, 1988 data shows an abysmal record
on this indicator: 570 deaths per 100,000 births. The record is more positive when it comes
to life expectancy at birth. This has increased form 58 years in 1987 to 62.9 years in 2000.

SACEPS Paper 6
3. Best Practices: A Garden of Hope

South Asian countries present an abiding paradox in the pessimism of its macro trends and
the rich tapestry of ‘best practices’ which cut across sectors and regions. Indeed, a number
of these ‘best practices’ have gone on to attract global renown. A comprehensive
inventory of best practices and a better understanding of what characteristics underlie
them has been an important lacuna in the various analysis and initiatives on poverty in the
region. Efficient documentation and appropriate dissemination of the lessons of best
practices can offer a critical ray of hope to those who are struggling against all odds to
create a more conducive South Asian ground reality. A best practice database can build a
bridge between empirical solutions, research and policy. South Asia lacks such an
evidence-based knowledge storehouse and a SAARC-level initiative in this regard may
indeed be very timely.
4. Roadmap towards a Poverty-free South Asia

No roadmap is or can be wholly new. Today’s challenge for the countries of South Asia
lies in finding the right balance, balance between growth and welfare objectives, balance
between a pro-active role for the state while minimising its involvement in actual
implementation, balance between embracing the opportunities of the global marketplace
while resisting the inequities and asymmetries of the globalisation process. A more
realistic approach to economic growth too is necessary. The critical importance of
economic growth for faster poverty reduction has to be recognised, but greater attention
has to paid to the poverty-growth interface. Experience has also shown that growth by
itself is inadequate to address the multi-dimensional problems of poverty due to the
structural rigidities and complexity of socio-cultural environments in South Asia.
4.1 Priorities and Targets

The struggle against poverty will never succeed if it continues to be an encyclopaedic
list of dos and don’ts bereft of any sense of strategic priority. Poverty is so pervasive in
South Asia that a million priorities will not exhaust the agenda but to get the
momentum going, the energies of South Asian nations have to be galvanised around a
few catalytic agendas. The foremost strategic priorities in this spirit are:
• Mobilising the power of the poor;

• Prudent macroeconomics;
• Mainstreaming the informal economy;

SACEPS Paper 6
• Enhancing gender and other equities;

• Sustainable development; and
• Effective, harmonious and all-round cooperation among the countries of the
region.
On the threshold of the new century, South Asia must combine both realism and
ambition in re-setting the targets by taking queue from its strategic priorities. While
detailed targeting is a matter for individual countries, the following set of core targets
can constitute a medium-term regional agenda:
• Halving poverty by 2010;

• Eradicating malnutrition and ensuring universal food security;
• Putting in place a social security system;
• Halving number of people without safe drinking water and sanitation
by 2010;
• Halving the number of people without access to primary education by
2010; and
• Eliminating all forms of trafficking and child labour.
4.2 Engaging with Implementation Issues

It is perhaps no exaggeration to say that implementation problems have proved to be
the bane of policy and programme initiatives on poverty reduction in the region. South
Asian countries can ill afford any continuing neglect of critical implementation
concerns.
These relate to coordination, decentralisation, corruption, accountability and

transparency, motivation, leadership and organisations, management of the policy
process, role of funding agencies and GO-NGO relationship. There are no simple
answers to such a multi-dimensional challenge; the search for remedies has to learn
from past experience and adhere to some basic principles. A sharper engagement with
implementation challenges, in general, will necessitate:
• Finding effective ways to minimise the role of government in actual

implementation;
• Being attentive to and pursuing both the ‘big solutions’ and the ‘small
solutions’;

SACEPS Paper 6
• Promoting local governance;

• Ensuring strong watchdog and advocacy roles by civil society;
• Enhancing credibility and trust in administrative intention by demonstrative
actions such as the launching of anti-corruption campaigns through the
prosecution of high-profile cases;
• Focusing on norms of practice rather than policy norms alone, a re-focusing
challenge applicable for both government agencies and NGOs; and
• Ensuring better information flows.
4.3 Recommendations on Regional Initiatives

Translating the priorities and targets set out above is primarily a matter for national
action. However, there are scopes for regional initiatives which are readily
implementable and which have clear potentials to accelerate the attack on poverty. The
Commission recommends the following list of six initiatives to be undertaken at the
SAARC-level:
• A South Asian database on poverty alleviation best practices and regional

cooperation programme on dissemination;
• Promotion of rural technology in SAARC;
• Review of laws and policies which impact on the livelihoods of the
poor;
• Cooperation and experience sharing on the following poverty-relevant
areas:
- Agricultural research and extension;
- Intellectual Property Rights in agriculture and protection of bio-
diversity;
- IPR-protected life saving drugs produced by MNC’s;
- Natural calamities and disaster mitigation strategies;
- Tourism; and
- Competition policy.
• Experience Sharing and co-operation on social sector policies; and
• Sharing of perspectives on multilateral negotiations having poverty
implications.

SACEPS Paper 6
5. Our Future, Our Responsibility

The countries of South Asia have their commonalities and differences. The challenges
they confront are complex and often intractable. Three are issues which bring them
together and those which divide them. But on one issue, the interests of the peoples and
the governments of South Asia are clearly fused. This is the issue of poverty.
Notwithstanding the despair in poverty statistics, a poverty-free South Asia is not an
impossible dream. Such a dream has already found roots in the hearts of millions in the
villages and in the towns, in the fields and in the factories, in offices and in homes across
the length and breadth of South Asia. The dream has already been dreamt. Realising it or
translating that dream into reality is our individual and collective responsibility.

SACEPS Paper 6
Annex B
List of Participants
(In alphabetical Order)
Mr. Salahuddin Ahmed Honorary Secretary General, Swanirvar

Bangladesh, Dhaka, and Former Secretary,
Ministry of Jute, GOB.
Dr. Quazi Mesbahuddin Ahmed Member (GED), Planning Commission
Mr. S. M. Mayeen Ahmed Executive Director, SARPV
Ambassador Abul Ahsan Former Foreign Secretary, GOB and Former
Secretary-General, SAARC
Professor M. M. Akash Department of Economics, University of Dhaka
Ms. Nasrin Akhter Research Fellow, BUP
Mr. S. M. Shah Alam Author & Director, Rural Development
Bangladesh (RDB)
Dr. Sheikh Maqsood Ali Former Member, Planning Commission
Mr. Khurshid Anwar Deputy High Commissioner
High Commission for the Islamic Republic of
Pakistan
Mr. G. S. Bhalla Professor Emeritus
Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
Ms. Sheila Bhalla Visiting Professor, Institute for Human
Development, New Delhi.
Mr. Sayed Alamgir Farrouk Chowdhury Former Secretary
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare
Ms. Rasheda K Chowdhury Director, CAMPE
Professor Muchkund Dubey President, Council for Social Development &
Former Foreign Secretary, Government of India
Dr. Godfrey Gunatilleke Deputy Chairman, Council of Fellows, Marga
Institute, Sri Lanka & Convenor, SACEPS Task
Force on the Citizen’s
Social Charter
Dr. Hameeda Hossain Director, Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK)
Mr. Shamsul Huda Secretary, ADSAC
Mr. S. M. Al- Husainy Former Chairman, Public Service
Commission (PSC) and Chairman, Swanirvar
Bangladesh
Mr. Shahidul Islam Programme Officer
Bangladesh Nari Progati Sangha (BNPS)
Mr. Mahbubul Islam General Secretary
Bangladesh Youth Union
Ms. Laila Rahman Kabir Member, CPD Board of Trustees, and
Former President, MCCI
Ms. Khushi Kabir Member, CPD Board of Trustees, and
Coordinator, Nijera Kori
Ambassador M.M. Rezaul Karim Member, Advisory Committee
Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)
Mr. Fazlul Karim Senior Research Fellow, BRAC
Dr. Rezaul Haq Khandker Former Advisor, UNDP, New York

SACEPS Paper 6
Mr. Abdul Majid Mallik Director, DEEDS

CARITAS-Bangladesh
Ms. Nasreen Awal Mintoo President, Women Entrepreneurs’
Association of Bangladesh
Ms. Banasree Mitra Program Co-ordinator, ALRD
Ms. Khawar Mumtaz Coordinator, Shirkat Gah, Karachi, Pakistan &
Coordinator, Citizen’s Social Charter
Preparation Task Force, Pakistan
Mr. Y. N. Pandel Royal Nepalese Embassy
Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahman Executive Chairman
People’s Participation Research Centre
(PPRC)
Ms. Rokia A Rahman Former Advisor,
Caretaker Government, Chairperson and
Managing Director RR Cold Storage
Dr. Rushidan Islam Rahman Research Director , Bangladesh Institute
of Development Studies
Mr. Waliur Rahman Director, Bangladesh Institute of Law and
International Affairs (BILIA), and
Former Ambassador
Ms. Lamia Rashid Head of Programme
Poverty and Working Children (PWC)
Save the Children (UK)
Mr. M. Ghulam Sattar Coordinator, Research Division, BRAC
Ms. Mashuda Khatun Shefali Executive Director, Nari Uddog Kendra
Dr. Hafiz G.A. Siddiqi Vice Chancellor, North South University
Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister
Mr. M Syeduzzaman Member, CPD Board of Trustees and
Chairman, Bank Asia
Mr. Muhammad Zamir Former Ambassador

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Paper No.

SOUTH ASIA CENTRE FOR POLICY STUDIES (SACEPS)

Major activities and programmes of SACEPS will include undertaking research

In order to sustain the commitment of policymakers towards South Asian Cooperation a

Report prepared by: Mr Tauhidul Hoque Chowdhury, Programme Associate, CPD

Opening Remarks by Professor Rehman Sobhan

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 1

• The signing of the SAARC Social Charter.

a. Investment cooperation in South Asia

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 2

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 3

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 4

The Issue of Best Practices

The Six Major Themes

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 5

Presentation by Dr. Kamal Uddin Siddiqui

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 6

Comments by the Designated Discussants

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 7

ourselves to initiative-based approaches which may neglect the more fundamental

Linking Poverty to Growth

Accessibility and Accountability

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 8

Dr. Quazi Mesbahuddin Ahmed

Emphasis on People’s Behavioural Change

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 9

Issue of Garden of Hope

Issue of Policy Formulation

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 10

Professor M.M. Akash

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 11

Micro Cases in the Report

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 12

Ms. Khawar Mumtaz

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 13

Issue of Social Structure

Views on Poverty: Policymakers Vs the Poor

Impact of Poverty on Women

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 14

Issue of Land Reform

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 15

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 16

Constraints to Agricultural Growth

Issue of Non-farm Sector

Mr. Muhammad Zamir

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 17

Mr. Waliur Rahman

Issue of Setting Target

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 18

Policy versus Initiative

Dr Rushidan Islam Rahman

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 19

Issue of Non-farm Sector

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 20

Issue of Land Reform

Mr Sayed Alamgir Farrouk Chowdhury

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 21

Mr. S.M. Al-Husainy

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 22

Mr. M. M. Rezaul Karim

Mobilising Power of the Poor

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 23

A SACEPS Dialogue on Poverty Alleviation in South Asia 24