Publication: To What Extent Are Bangladesh's Recent Gains in Poverty Reduction Different from the Past?
Loading...
Published
2010-02
ISSN
Date
2014-09-02
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
The poor in Bangladesh are more likely to belong to households with a larger number of dependents and lower education among household members, be engaged in daily wage labor, own little land, and be less likely to receive remittances. This poverty profile for 2005 is similar to the profile in the mid-1980s and hence at first glance it would appear that little has changed over time. A closer look at national household survey data suggests a more nuanced story. This paper uses the latest two rounds of the Bangladesh Household Income and Expenditure Survey to decompose the micro-determinants of poverty reduction between 2000 and 2005, closely following a similar analysis using five earlier rounds of the Survey. The comparison of results shows that the spatial distribution of poverty seen in earlier decades has changed with time and the drivers of poverty reduction are different in several respects.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Kotikula, Aphichoke; Narayan, Ambar; Zaman, Hassan. 2010. To What Extent Are Bangladesh's Recent Gains in Poverty Reduction Different from the Past?. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 5199. © http://hdl.handle.net/10986/19913 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Publication Climate and Social Sustainability in Fragility, Conflict, and Violence Contexts(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-07)Climate change is widely recognized as a driver of violent conflict, but its broader social effects remain less understood. Ignoring these dimensions risks a vicious cycle where climate policies might undermine socially just adaptation. Evidence is still limited on how climate shocks influence political participation, trust, or migration. This paper helps fill that gap by examining links between climate change, conflict, and social sustainability, with a focus on inclusion, resilience, cohesion, and legitimacy. Using secondary data from 2019–24, the study applies simple correlation-based methods to test three hypotheses on the nature, severity, and composition of these associations. The analysis combines multiple climate impact measures, new conflict classifications, recent social sustainability frameworks, and controls for population and geography. The results reveal strong correlations—not causation—between climate events and contexts of fragility, conflict, and violence. Climate impacts are most pronounced in both national and subnational conflict settings. The study also finds robust links between fragility, conflict, and violence and low levels of social sustainability, reflecting its role as both a driver and consequence of conflict. Some dimensions—such as violent events and insecurity—appear weaker in areas most affected by climate shocks. Two of the hypotheses are supported, and one remains inconclusive.Publication The Macroeconomic Implications of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Options(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-05-29)Estimating the macroeconomic implications of climate change impacts and adaptation options is a topic of intense research. This paper presents a framework in the World Bank's macrostructural model to assess climate-related damages. This approach has been used in many Country Climate and Development Reports, a World Bank diagnostic that identifies priorities to ensure continued development in spite of climate change and climate policy objectives. The methodology captures a set of impact channels through which climate change affects the economy by (1) connecting a set of biophysical models to the macroeconomic model and (2) exploring a set of development and climate scenarios. The paper summarizes the results for five countries, highlighting the sources and magnitudes of their vulnerability --- with estimated gross domestic product losses in 2050 exceeding 10 percent of gross domestic product in some countries and scenarios, although only a small set of impact channels is included. The paper also presents estimates of the macroeconomic gains from sector-level adaptation interventions, considering their upfront costs and avoided climate impacts and finding significant net gross domestic product gains from adaptation opportunities identified in the Country Climate and Development Reports. Finally, the paper discusses the limits of current modeling approaches, and their complementarity with empirical approaches based on historical data series. The integrated modeling approach proposed in this paper can inform policymakers as they make proactive decisions on climate change adaptation and resilience.Publication Institutional Capacity for Policy Implementation: An Analytical Framework(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-07)State capacity is an important prerequisite for policy implementation, yet at the country level it is difficult to measure, assess, and reform. This paper proposes a focus on institutional capacity: the ability of public institutions to implement the specific policy mandates for which they are responsible. Based on a review of existing literature, the paper defines the different dimensions that compose institutional capacity and groups them into two cross-cutting categories: organizational dimensions (personnel, financial resources, information systems, and management practices) and governance dimensions (transparency, independence, and accountability). The paper proposes measures for organizational and governance dimensions using existing data, shows intra-institutional variation of these measures within countries, and discusses how new data could be collected for better measurement of these concepts. Finally, the paper illustrates how the framework can be used to diagnose the sources of common problems related to weak policy implementation.Publication South Africa’s Fragmented Cities: The Unequal Burden of Labor Market Frictions(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-08)Using high-resolution administrative, census, and satellite data, this paper shows that South African cities are characterized by spatial mismatches between where people live and where jobs are located, relative to 20 global peers. Areas within 5 kilometers of commercial centers have 9,300 fewer residents per square kilometer than expected, which is 60 percent below the global median. Poor, dense neighborhoods are most affected. In Johannesburg, a 10-percentile increase in distance from the nearest business hub corresponds to a 3.7-percentile drop in asset wealth (a proxy of household wellbeing) and 4.9-percentile drop in employment. In Cape Town, the declines are 4.0 and 3.7 percentiles, respectively. Employment is 87 percent lower in the poorest decile than the richest in Johannesburg and 61 percent lower in Cape Town. These findings suggest that South Africa’s spatial organization of people and economic activity constrains agglomeration and reinforces inequality. This methodology provides a scalable and standardized data-driven framework to analyze spatial accessibility and agglomeration frictions in complex, data-constrained urban systems.Publication Investment in Emerging and Developing Economies(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-07)The world faces a pressing challenge to meet key development objectives amid slowing growth and rising macroeconomic and geopolitical risks. With the number of job seekers rising rapidly, infrastructure shortfalls continuing to be large, and climate costs mounting, the case for a significant investment push has never been stronger. Yet the capacity to respond in many emerging markets and developing economies has eroded. Since the global financial crisis, investment growth has slowed to about half its pace in the 2000s, with both public and private investment weakening. Foreign direct investment inflows—a critical source of capital, technology, and managerial know-how—have also fallen sharply and become increasingly concentrated, leaving low-income countries with only a marginal share. The risks of further retrenchment are significant, as trade tensions, policy uncertainty, and elevated debt levels continue to weigh on investment. Reigniting momentum will require ambitious domestic reforms to strengthen institutions, rebuild macro-fiscal stability, and deepen trade and investment integration—the foundations of a supportive business climate. At the same time, international cooperation is indispensable. A renewed commitment to a predictable system of cross-border trade and investment flows, combined with scaled-up financial support and sustained technical assistance, is essential to help emerging markets and developing economies—especially low-income countries and economies in fragile and conflict situations—bridge financing gaps and implement the domestic reforms needed to restore investment as an engine of growth, jobs, and development.
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Poverty Assessment for Bangladesh(World Bank, Dhaka, 2008-10)Bangladesh has made good progress in reducing poverty over the past decade despite the series of external shocks which have routinely affected the country. Poverty fell from 49 percent in 2000 to 40 percent in 2005, propelled by respectable economic growth and relatively stable inequality. These statistics are reflected in tangible improvements in poor people's lives, such as a sharp reduction in those living under flimsy straw roofs in rural areas. Unfortunately, climatic shocks such as the 2007 floods and cyclone, as well as rising food prices, have slowed the country's progress in reducing poverty. Despite these setbacks we expect that Bangladesh will reach its Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the number of people living in extreme poverty by 2015. Poverty reduction is not just about improving household income, but also about enhancing human capability. Our optimism in Bangladesh's future is also based on its significant gains in human development over the past 15 years. Despite its recent progress in reducing poverty, Bangladesh remains a poor country with about 56 million poor people in 2005 and continuing disparities across occupational groups, gender, and regions. Although growing regional inequality is characteristic of many developing countries experiencing rapid economic growth, Bangladesh is somewhat unique in that the natural boundaries created by its rivers limit integration between economically unequal geographic areas. This report shows that higher productivity in agriculture, job creation in urban growth poles and promoting migration will be essential for further poverty reduction across Bangladesh. Sustaining this reduction will require maintaining the progress made thus far in slowing population growth, and providing better quality options in schooling and healthcare. Another urgent priority is to better coordinate the country's existing safety net system in order to expand effective programs in line with the needs of the poor.Publication Bangladesh - Poverty Assessment : Assessing a Decade of Progress in Reducing Poverty, 2000-2010(World Bank, Dhaka, 2013-06)The purpose of this report is to document some of the aforementioned achievements over the 2000-2010 decade and to illustrate their collective impact on poverty in Bangladesh. Analysis is undertaken to identify which factors contributed to the rapid decline in poverty over time. The main limitation of this report is that the analysis is based on a limited number of data sources, which do not cover all aspects of the poverty reduction process. Nevertheless, to the extent possible, the analysis covers the key drivers of poverty reduction over what has been a remarkable decade for Bangladesh. The report is organized into four parts. Part one focuses on explaining poverty patterns observed over the 2000-2010 period, noting qualitative differences between the first and second half of the decade. The analysis in chapter one offers poverty projections based on survey data from this period. Chapter two describes some key characteristics of the poor. Using poverty decomposition methodology, part two identifies the main drivers of the poverty reduction experienced over the last decade. Chapter three shows that the two most important contributors to poverty reduction over the 2000-2010 periods were the growth of labor income and the declining dependency ratio. The remaining two chapters in this section focus on labor income and demographic factors to understand their respective linkages to poverty. The past few years have underscored the importance of global factors affecting country-level outcomes. However, the series of shocks that affected Bangladesh in 2007-2008 did not significantly slow down the speed of poverty reduction. In Chapters six and seven of part three, the report attempts to uncover some of the reasons underlying Bangladesh's resilience to these global shocks as well as the way in which poor households cope with seasonal shocks, which are a permanent feature of some rural parts of the country, namely Rangpur. Chapters eight and nine explore the role of safety nets and microfinance in helping households deal with shocks and poverty. In part four, chapter ten revisits one of the key findings of the World Bank poverty assessment of 2005 (published in 2008).Publication Economic Inequality in the Arab Region(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-06)The paper uses harmonized household survey micro-data to assess the levels and determinants of economic inequality in 12 Arab countries. It focuses on the sources of rural-urban, as well as metropolitan-nonmetropolitan, inequalities and applies the unconditional quantile regression decomposition technique to analyze the welfare gaps across the entire distribution. The analysis finds moderate inequality levels, with the Gini coefficient for the distribution of household real per capita total expenditures ranging between 30.7 in Libya and 45 in Mauritania. Differences in households' endowments, such as demographic composition, human capital, and community characteristics, appear as the main sources of the urban-rural welfare gap. There is inequality between metropolitan and non-metropolitan regions in many countries, mainly because of differences in returns to households' characteristics and particularly returns to human capital.Publication Tackling Poverty in Northern Ghana(World Bank, 2011-03-01)Twenty years of rapid economic development in Ghana has done little, if anything, to reduce the historical North, South divide in standards of living. While rural development and urbanization have led to significant poverty reduction in the South, similar dynamics have been largely absent from Northern Ghana (or equivalently the North, defined as the sum of the administrative regions Upper West, Upper East, and the Northern region), which cover 40 percent of Ghana's land area. Between 1992 and 2006, the number of the poor declined by 2.5 million in the South and increased by 0.9 million in the North. In sharp contrast with the South, there was no significant decline in the proportion of poor in the population of the North. Ghana's success story in poverty reduction is the success story of its South. Finally, North-South migration should not be seen as detracting from the potential development of Northern Ghana. North-South migration is potentially a strong instrument for poverty alleviation. With the right human capital, many individuals could escape from poverty through migration to the dynamic South. This phenomenon however, remains marginal today. By the same token, greater North-South migration will most likely be a consequence of any development in Northern Ghana, at least for some decades. Indeed, with greater economic integration and better public service provision, the probability that residents of Northern Ghana will benefit from migration will tremendously increase, thus their incentive to migrate. Hence, one should not expect lower migration pressures from the development of Northern Ghana in the short run. On the contrary, attention should be paid to the quality of migration, which will entail strengthening social protection mechanisms to reduce negative migration, and raising human capital while increasing the absorptive capacities of cities to encourage positive migration. This migration to the South will further benefit the North, since migrants will add to the pool of remittances sent to Northern Ghana.Publication 2011 Philippines Development Report : Generating Inclusive Growth to Uplift the Poor(World Bank, 2011-02-01)The theme of the 2011 Philippines development report is 'generating inclusive growth, uplifting the poor and vulnerable'. This theme is follows from the priorities set in President Aquino's Social Contract and the emerging 2011-2016 Philippines Development Plan (PDP). The PDP details the vision of inclusive growth and poverty reduction that underlies the social contract (chapter one). Accordingly, the PDP focuses on three strategic objectives: (1) attaining a sustained and high rate of economic growth that provides productive employment opportunities, (2) equalizing access to development opportunities for all Filipinos, and (3) implementing effective social safety nets to protect and enable those who do not have the capability to participate in the economic growth process. While the country's development agenda remains broadly the same over the last decade, the Aquino government is focusing on stepped-up implementation and delivery. The pressing development issues confronting the Philippines in 2011 are not radically different from those of previous years. The critical difference is the new government's focus on effective implementation and delivery of public goods and services, starting with a firm approach to fighting corruption and improving governance.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Digital Africa(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13)All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.Publication Regional Poverty and Inequality Update: Latin America and the Caribbean, October 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-10-23)This brief summarizes recent facts related to poverty and inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) using the latest wave of harmonized household surveys from the Socio-Economic Database for LAC (SEDLAC). This brief was produced by the Poverty Global Practice in the LAC Region of the World Bank.Publication Europe and Central Asia Economic Update, Fall 2024: Better Education for Stronger Growth(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-17)Economic growth in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) is likely to moderate from 3.5 percent in 2023 to 3.3 percent this year. This is significantly weaker than the 4.1 percent average growth in 2000-19. Growth this year is driven by expansionary fiscal policies and strong private consumption. External demand is less favorable because of weak economic expansion in major trading partners, like the European Union. Growth is likely to slow further in 2025, mostly because of the easing of expansion in the Russian Federation and Turkiye. This Europe and Central Asia Economic Update calls for a major overhaul of education systems across the region, particularly higher education, to unleash the talent needed to reinvigorate growth and boost convergence with high-income countries. Universities in the region suffer from poor management, outdated curricula, and inadequate funding and infrastructure. A mismatch between graduates' skills and the skills employers are seeking leads to wasted potential and contributes to the region's brain drain. Reversing the decline in the quality of education will require prioritizing improvements in teacher training, updated curricula, and investment in educational infrastructure. In higher education, reforms are needed to consolidate university systems, integrate them with research centers, and provide reskilling opportunities for adult workers.Publication Philippines Country Climate and Development Report(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-11)Climate change poses major risks for development in the Philippines. Climate shocks, whether in the form of extreme weather events or slow-onset trends, will hamper economic activities, damage infrastructure, and induce deep social disruptions. Adaptation to the risks of climate change, including both extreme events and slow-onset problems, is thus critical for the Philippines. Policy inaction would impose substantial economic and human costs, especially for the poor. Adaptation cannot eliminate the costs of climate change, but it can substantially reduce them. Many adaptation responses also contribute to mitigation; conversely, many mitigation measures generate local co-benefits, such as reduced air pollution. Although the Philippines is a relatively low emitter of greenhouse gas (GHG), it can contribute to global mitigation efforts through an energy transition, including a shift away from coal. The investment costs of such adaptation measures and an energy transition are substantial but not out of reach. The Philippines Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) comprehensively analyzes how climate change will affect the country's ability to meet its development goals and pursue green, resilient, and inclusive development. The CCDR helps identify opportunities for climate action by both the public and private sectors and prioritizes the most urgent development challenges impacted by climate change in the Philippines.Publication EdTech in Developing Countries(Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank, 2021-08-02)The emergence of educational technology (“EdTech”) in developing countries has been received as a promising avenue to address some of the most challenging policy questions within educational systems. In this paper, I review and synthesize all existing studies with credible causal identification frameworks of EdTech interventions in developing countries. While other studies review the evidence for EdTech interventions in developed countries, there is currently no equivalent study for developing contexts, in spite of the rising number of studies being produced. I classify studies into four thematic categories based on the type of EdTech intervention analyzed: Access to technology; technology-enabled behavioral interventions; improvements to instruction; and self-led learning. I find that EdTech interventions centered around self-led learning and improvements to instruction are the most effective forms of EdTech at raising learning outcomes. Similarly, technology-enabled behavioral interventions are less promising for generating large effects but highly cost-effective given their typically low marginal costs. Although expanding access to technology alone is not sufficient to improve learning, it is a necessary first step for some other types of interventions. More broadly, the overall success of interventions rests on the thoughtful customization of the EdTech solution to the policy constraints at hand. Finally, EdTech interventions across all thematic areas can and should act as complements by leveraging their respective comparative advantages to address deficiencies within educational systems in developing countries.