Chairperson's Remarks at the South Asia Economic Summit Conference

22 October 2011.
Fourth South Asia Economic Summit,
Current Phase of the Recovery and Implications for South Asia,
Speech delivered by Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, Guest of Honour.

"It seems that South Asia weathered the fall outs of the global economic and financial crisis relatively well, though the impact of the recent euro crisis on exports and growth in South Asia is still uncertain. These aggregate level perspectives of the macroeconomic adjustments however do not fully reveal the new set of risks that are emerging along with the traditional structural problems and the prevalent widespread poverty and vulnerability. It is these human dimensions of the crisis that I want to focus on in my brief remarks.

The poor are hit the hardest by any economic downturn. The poor take much longer to recover, as recovery in real wages and employment take much longer than recovery in GDP. Poorer people are affected more than others because they have fewer buffers, and because the range and effectiveness of their buffers are inadequate. The poor lack assets and predominantly possess unskilled-labour and engage in the informal sector. This restricts their ability to cope by switching jobs, and expose them to unregulated labour markets. In addition, economic downturns push poor households into a vicious cycle of poverty. They are often forced to respond with measures that keep them poor: reducing the number and quality of meals, postponing health-related expenditure and withdrawing children from school. These actions lead to lower future income-earning potential for current and future generations, resulting in a trap of persistent poverty.  And the women and children bear the greatest brunt of these damaging fluctuations and adjustments.

The immediate and the longer term, perhaps even inter generational impact of the global food crisis, fallout of the economic and financial crisis, has been dire and the term ‘recovery’ is perhaps too premature to be used in describing its current phase. Let’s put the trend in some perspective. In 2007 alone, the prices of principle food staples—rice, corn, soybeans and wheat, effectively doubled throughout the world. This was an unprecedented rise and it revered the more than 50 years of declining prices. We know the results which were immediate and devastating. By the most conservative estimates, globally, the number of hungry or chronically malnourished rose by at least 100 million, to nearly one billion people—that is almost one seventh of the world’s population.  Though the grain prices have declined substantially since 2008, experts agree that they are poised to rise again.

Recent evidence from developing country settings confirms that increases in food prices cause maternal and child under nutrition levels to rise rapidly.  And the negative impact starts with the unborn child in the womb—it is quality and not just the quantity of the diet during pregnancy that is important for successful birth outcomes. The consumption of more expensive micronutrient rich food (milk, green leafy vegetables and fruits) during pregnancy is found to be positively associated with the size of the infant at birth. Rapidly increasing food prices are also likely to cause nutritional insults very early in pregnancy, which will influence later fetal and infant growth. The full human cost of the food crisis may thus well be intergenerational and very expensive for the society and the economy.

The crisis has a number of drivers which include the diversion of grains in North America and Western Europe to bio fuel production; higher energy costs which translate into more expensive chemical fertilizers; and financial speculation over staple crops, which cause price fluctuations. The situation is further aggravated by underlying trends such as rapid population growth. Climate change is also threatening to lower crop yields at precisely the time when staple foods urgently need to be produced.

What needs to be done? Issues of both production and distribution are important here and should be approach in an integrated way. In my view, we should focus on two strategic priorities that lie at the centre of both the production and distribution aspects of the problem—getting elimination of hunger and malnutrition at the centre of our politics and reenergizing the women’s economic empowerment agenda.

We know that food, hunger and politics are inextricably linked. When governments have been committed, progress has been very rapid, as the examples of China, Thailand, Vietnam, Mexico and most brilliantly Brazil have demonstrated conclusively over the last three decades. In contrast,  the prevalence of underweight children in the South Asian countries barring the shining example of Sri Lanka, is among the highest in the world, and is nearly double that of Sub-Saharan Africa with dire consequences for mobility, mortality, productivity and economic growth. Unless governments are made to care for its citizens going hungry and are fully committed to reducing the number of hungry and chronically malnourished people, no solutions will have the political teeth to make the real dent.

We need to turn this agenda as a central part of our political process and one of the non negotiable KPIs of any regime. Concrete targets and action plan in reducing the number of citizens who are hungry and are chronically malnourished should be a critical part of every electoral manifesto and this has to be made a popular topic of public debates. The targets have to be broken down by local constituencies to reflect regional differences and also to decentralize and amplify citizen monitoring and voice. A compact between the different development actors will be forged at every political constituency to deliver on the local target plan. In the final analysis, food security is an issue of citizenship and a matter of fundamental citizenship rights. We need to centre our politics around this fundamental element of the social contract between a citizen and her state.

Let me now turn to the other strategic priority— eliminating the gender gap. There are two very influential global reports—the Global Hunger Index (GHI) report and Gender Gap Report (GGR). IFPRI researchers examined the relationship between these two indices and found gender inequality and hunger go hand in hand--- an important step to ending world hunger is thus empowering women and eradicating gender disparities in education, health, economic participation, and political opportunities.

What type of gender gap matters more for hunger? Is it different in different parts of the world? The Gender Gap Index is divided into four sub components—economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival and political empowerment. The researchers find that while in Sub Saharan Africa, the gender gap in educational attainment is the primary driver, in case of South Asia; it is the gender inequality in the health and survival domain, i.e. the inequality between men and women in healthy life expectancy and sex ratio at child birth, which is the main driver of hunger. Here's a statistic to digest - 49 percent of children under five in South Asia are underweight. In sub-Saharan Africa, a region many associate with images of starving children, the figure is 28 percent. India, Bangladesh and Pakistan together account for half the world's underweight children. This is directly related to women’s status in south Asia.

To address this, it is important that we invest in women’s and girls’ nutrition over the life cycle and build support for women’s empowerment in communities. I would like to underline the focus on taking a ‘life cycle’ approach to nutrition and the importance of empowering the women beyond the household—in public life and in her community. Ultimately, the structural cause of the gender gap is the inequality that exists in economic and political participation—narrowing this gap is fundamental to sustaining any progress that is made in addressing the gender gaps in the more practical needs domain. Working at the policy and advocacy level to strengthen women’s property rights and creating pressure from below by improving women’s legal awareness are keys to addressing the structural constraints.

As citizens of a part of the world that is successfully tackling the complex challenges of economic management and delivering on solid growth in an uncertain world, we cannot accept the political irresponsibility of our governments failing to ensure that no one suffers the indignity of going hungry and the denial of an opportunity to realize the full potential of our children because of being malnourished. This is doable-- one of the greatest accomplishments of the 20th century was to make famine which seemed inevitable, a rarity. Today, famine is almost invariably the product of evil governments or no governments. So with right politics as global humanity we have been able to consign to the museums the hunger that kills. The 21st century challenge is to do that for the hunger that stunt and wastes our potential. "

 

22 October 2011, Dhaka. “Poribesh Poricchonno Rakhi, Shobai Mile Shustho Thaki” (Clean neighbourhood, Feeling good) with this slogan, the Slum Poverty Alleviation Committee of Mohammadpur Johuri Moholla Slum arranged a cleanliness day on 22 October, 2011. With the presence of community leaders, Ward Commission representatives and area police representatives, the programme begins with cleaning the slum neighbourhood, roads and households, along with creating awareness among the slum dwellers to keep their surroundings clean and hygienic.

BRAC’s Ultra poor programme’s urban initiative organised the discussion, followed by a rally in the neighbourhood and providing the ultra poor members with waste baskets to continue maintaining their locale clean. Many children from the slum participated and learned about this issue. In addition to that, it worked on strengthening the linkage with local government, affiliates and Dhaka City Corporation with the ultra poor community in Mohammadpur Slum. The programme was implemented in the light of creating an overall culture of healthy living, and setting the best possible personal and environmental hygiene based standards for the urban slum dwellers.

According to the local slum dwellers, the programme left a lasting impact on their community. Many visitors expressed interest in setting up a similar programme in their own locality.

12 October 2011, Dhaka. As part of BRAC Advocacy month-long activities on the observance of International Day for the Eradication of Poverty 2011, Dhaka University Debating Society (DUDS), in cooperation with Advocacy for Social Change, BRAC and Youth Forum for Poverty Alleviation and Development (YFPAD), has organised a debate competition titled BRAC Advocacy 1st Inter Hall Female Debate Championship 2011 in the University of Dhaka on Ultra Poverty issue at TSC, Dhaka University on October 2-3, 2011.

Advocacy for Social Change, BRAC seeks to mobilise and raise awareness among youth towards the issue of extreme poverty. We organise quiz, seminar and debate from grassroots to national level to address the issue. We have already reached 2.17 million school, college and university level students. Now we have taken a step forward in engaging the youth of urban areas.

The topic of the final debate was “We are Poor because we are Poor.”  Samsun Nahar Hall, became the champion and Bangladesh-Kuwait Maitree Hall, was the runner-up.

Dr. A.A.M.S Arefin Siddique, Vice Chancellor of Dhaka University was present as the Chief Guest of the event. Special guests were Professor Dr. Mahbuba Nasrin - Professor of mass communication & journalism department, Moderator of DUDS; Professor Mahfuza Khanam; General Secretary of Asiatic Society, Bangladesh; Khushi Kabir - Coordinator of Nijera Kori and Sheepa Hafiza - Director of BRAC Gender Justice & Diversity and Advocacy. Provosts of female halls and Alamgir Hossain - Director of TSC were also present.

We strongly believe that engaging the youth in such national issues will bring about positive changes in the future.

12 October 2011, This Wednesday evening, BRAC UK will be running a LIVE  telethon appeal on Channel S to raise much needed funds for Vision Bangladesh.

From 7 pm onwards, studio guests representing Vision Bangladesh and the Bangladeshi catering community across the UK will be appearing to discuss their involvement in Vision Bangladesh's new £1 on the Bill campaign. It would be fantastic if BRAC esteemed colleagues could encourage their friends and families to ring in on the night and make a personal donation.

Vision Bangladesh is a partnership between BRAC and Sightsavers and the aim is to eliminate avoidable blindness across Bangladesh by the year 2020 starting with the Sylhet region by 2013.

80% of blindness in the country is from easily treatable cataracts – occurring in both young adults and children, not just the elderly. Every year, 150,000 more cases are added to the backlog of nearly one million poor people who are denied the simple procedure that could save their sight – and their future.

Cataract surgery is one of the most cost effective health interventions (£20 for an operation). The real tragedy of blindness in Bangladesh is that the majority of the cases are unnecessary – having cataracts should not inevitably lead to blindness.

Vision Bangladesh is the biggest campaign of its type and has already implemented over 21,000 successful cataract operations since January 2011. The campaign needs your help to reach the whole of the Sylhet region by 2013.

So please watch Channel S (Sky channel 814) and ring in to donate and support Vision Bangladesh.

For viewers outside of UK, the details of the new transponder are as follows:
Satellite:  Eurobird 1
Orbital Location:  28.5º East
Transponder:  F1 Upper
Uplink Frequency / Polarity: 14 059.67 Vertical (Y)
Downlink Frequency / Polarity:  12 559.67 Horizontal (X)
Symbol Rate: 27.5 Msys/s
FEC: 2/3

STUDIO HOTLINE: 44 208 523 411

DONATION HOTLINE: 44 208 523 1666

“It is the poorest people who are most at risk of blindness and low vision as they are more likely to go blind for a lack of simple treatment and stay blind for a lack of simple surgery.” - Founder and Chairperson of BRAC, Sir Fazle Hasan Abed