Bangladesh: Lessons for Kenya

Labourers chip away on a grounded vessel at a ship-breaking yard in Chittagong, Bangladesh. Apart from ship-building, the country is also big in the other extreme; dismantling these mammoth man-made creatures, often with minimal tools, and selling the scrap to metal-reliant industries. PHOTO / Bernard Mwinzi

On April 14 this year, hundreds of thousands of Bangladeshi poured into the streets of Dhaka to usher in the new year 1419 of the Bengali calendar. There was merriment and a sense of camaraderie everywhere as the whole country exploded in a vibrant festivity, women wearing red-and-white saris and glass bangles and men resplendent in Punjabi and Dhoti outfits.

To the ruling Bangladesh Awami League, however, there was more to those celebrations than just the new year. After years of struggle, Bangladesh is slowly rising from the ashes of destitution and hopelessness, aided to a large part by the open investment policies of the government and the hardworking nature of the 160 million people who call this tiny nation up the Bay of Bengal home.

Add to that the overwhelming sense of nationalism that sweeps the streets of Dhaka, mix it with the deliberate call to patriotism on every corner of the huge Asian metropolis, and you will begin to understand why this quiet revolution has become "the Bengali way of life", in the words of the country's Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

In a way, Bangladesh is the Asian carbon copy of Kenya. Both are third world countries that have faced huge economic challenges, and both are on the cusp of a phenomenal take-off.

For instance, Dhaka has created a development blueprint titled Vision 2021 that seeks, among others, to position the country as a middle-income economy in less than 20 years.

This, says Mohamed Mijarul Quayes, the Foreign Secretary, will be achieved through the provision of "quality education, infrastructure, ICT technology, good investment climate and incentives, and modern-day agricultural facilities".

The country does not have an ICT project as ambitious as Kenya's planned Konza technopolis, but it has articulated the Digital Bangladesh vision and launched a number of initiatives aimed at demonstrating the benefits that come with a digital age.

"The vision will offer us a tremendous opportunity to leap-frog the campaign towards becoming a middle-income journey," says an official of the Access to Information Programme which is tasked with formulating the framework for the project.

"We plan to mainstream ICT as a pro-poor tool to eradicate poverty, establish good governance, ensure social equity through quality education, healthcare and law enforcement for all, and prepare the economy for climate change."

It is the last target, however, that may end up giving Dhaka a run for its money. The National Geographic ranks Bangladesh as the most vulnerable nation to the impacts of climate change in the coming decades.

Located at the bottom of the mighty GBM river system (Ganges, Brahmaputra and the Meghna) there are a total of 57 trans-boundary rivers coming down to it; 54 from neighbouring India and three from Mynmar. The country has no control of the water flow and volume drains to the Bay of Bengal.

Coupled with the high level of widespread poverty and increasing population density, limited adaptive capacity and poorly funded, ineffective local governance has made the region one of the most adversely affected in the planet.

There are an estimated 1,000 people in each square kilometre of Bangladesh, and with the national population increasing by two million people every year, almost half of the population lives in poverty when assessed using the purchasing power parity of $1.25 (about Sh140) per person per day.

This explains why these people do not have the ability to respond to a natural disaster, and why the government can do little to help them.

Driving down the narrow highway from the capital to Chittagong, the country's major seaport, the effects of climate change become clear.

Since no part of the delta area is more than 150 metres above sea level, floodwaters cover most of the land surface during the rainy season, damaging crops and injuring the economy.

The northwestern section of the country, drained by the Tista River, is somewhat higher and less flat, but the only really hilly regions are in the east, notably in the Chittagong Hill Tracts to the southeast and the Sylhet District to the northeast.

Various countries have pledged to provide funding for programmes aimed at mitigating the effects of climate change, but Foreign minister Dipu Moni says little has trickled their way.

"There were pledges made to us during the Durban Conference on Climate Change held in South Africa last year," says Dr Moni, "but we are yet to receive any money. Climate change seems to only affect the developing world, hence the inaction of the world super-powers who contribute more than 80 per cent of global carbon emissions."

The global community has committed up to $30 billion of immediate short term funding over the 2010-2012 period from developed to developing countries to support their action in climate change mitigation.

This funding is available for developing nations to build their capacity to reduce emissions and respond to impacts of climate change. Use of the funds will be balanced between mitigation and infrastructure adaptation in various sectors, including forestry, science, technology and capacity building.

But, floods or no floods, this waterlogged country wrapped around the armpit of India is certainly raring to go. In Chittagong, for instance, local engineers this month built the largest ship ever conceived and manufactured in Bangladesh, while a few kilometres away men chipped away, using minimalist tools like gas cutters and hammers, on a mammoth super-ship docked in a private ship-breaking yard.

It is this selfless and inspiring individual industry, says Mr Jalal Khaled, the quality management director at the Western Marine Shipyard in Chittagong, that has breathed vibrancy in the economy.

"We have begun the journey toward the achievement of our inspiration," says Mr Khaled, pointing to the astonishing growth of the ship-building sector in the country in the last couple of years. "(We do this) because there cannot be any faster or surer path for a nation to achieve economic solvency."

Bangladesh's development of the ship-building sector, however, depends on the opening up of market and improvement of the investment climate, because only this can "enhance Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and the establishment of Joint Ventures (JVs)," says Mr Khaled.

And it is the realisation of that fact that has led the country into a massive publicity campaign, something akin to Brand Kenya’s mandate. To draw global attention, Dhaka is showcasing and highlighting the strengths of its people, trade, tourism, infrastructure development, government system, heritage and culture.

The country has also adopted an open-door policy to attract foreign investment and stimulate rapid economic growth, particularly through industrialisation. The Bangladesh Export Processsing Zones Authority (Bepza) is the official organ of the government to promote, attract, and facilitate foreign investment across the country.

By offering a number of incentives, including tax holidays, income tax exemptions for foreign professionals, duty-free importation of machinery and raw materials and duty-free export of finished goods, Bepza has received numerous applications from foreign investors and set up eight EPZs; in Dhaka, Chittagong, Mongla (a southern port city), Comilla (a unique city located between the capital and Chittagong, Ishwardi, and one on the banks of the enormous Karhapuli River.

In Chittagong, over 170,000 skilled and semi-skilled workers toil within an enormous complex that houses, among others, textile industries, agro-based industries, software engineering ventures, and shoe factories. For as little as $48 a month (about Sh3,900), the workers spent up to eight hours a day in the facility and earn their employers millions of dollars annually.

In March 2012 alone, for instance, the Chittagong EPZ exported $135,089 (about Sh11.2 million) worth of goods to various countries, including economies in the European Union and America.

These low wages compared to export earnings have drawn criticisms from labour organisations, with some even likening the working environment to some form of exploitative slavery that does little to advance the economic priorities of Bangladesh and its people.

But the investors and government officials disagree. "This is a poor country," explains Dr Moni, responding to a question on whether the government is supporting an exploitative industry. "The wages may be low, but they are sustaining. If we raise them, we will end up making our products non-competitive in the international market."

This low-cost investment has made Bangladesh the second highest exporter of ready-made garments in the world. The country is also big in tea, leather, china, and pharmaceuticals, with growing exports to over 70 countries all over the world.

But it is not only goods that Dhaka is exporting. With a population of over 160 million cramped within the confines of 147,000 square kilometres of land mass, Bangladesh is gasping for space.

The country has the highest population density in the world, at 1,000 heads per square kilometre. For the US to achieve that kind of density, it will have to move all the seven billion souls in the world and put them within its borders.

Because of this disturbing population scenario, employment is hard to come by, and so today over eight million Bangladeshis work abroad, contributing in excess of $12 billion in foreign remittances to the country through official and unofficial channels annually.

That population challenge, coupled with a high poverty rate, climate change effects, natural disasters and infrastructure woes, has been a constant pain on the sides of economic planners over the last decade.

Still, despite all this, the country has achieved an impressive six per cent annual gross domestic product growth over the last six years to post over $100 billion – or 0.16 of the world economy, according to the World Bank -- in the last fiscal year.

To understand the driving force behind those statistics, you need to examine the philosophy of the Bengali mind. Barely 40 years ago, this mellow nation went through a cruel liberation war as it sought independence from the invading forces of Pakistan.

Millions died, hundreds of thousands of women were raped, young lives -- some as young as two years -- were cut short by the bullets of the invaders, and that history is kept well, for posterity, public display and as a sign of "where we have come from", at the Bagladesh War Museum in the middle of Dhaka.

"It was a massive, massive struggle," says Mr Mahi Uddin Zia, a charming tour operator who has guided tourists across Africa, Asia, Europe and Australia. "It was devastating, but it helped build in the Bengali mind a sense of patriotism equalled nowhere in the world."

To the average man and woman on the streets, the nation comes first when making life's choices. Food may be hard to come by, the rains may wash away their rice fields, a kamikaze bus driver may run over a child walking home from school, or a government official get over-zealous and dip his fingers into the national cookie jar, but none of that will dampen the spirit of the people.

It is this sense of collective belonging, this unwavering spirit of nationalism, that has brought Bangladesh to the cusp of a rebirth. Mr Jalal Khaled of the Western Marine Shipyard in Chittagong explains, with religious conviction and a soupcon of Bengali poetry, what keeps the nation going:

"We pray that peoples of all faiths, all races and all nations may have their great human needs satisfied; that those who are well-off will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities towards those who are not as lucky. That the sufferings of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear from the earth, and that, in the course of time, all peoples will come to live together in peace and harmony, guaranteed by the binding force of mutual respect and fellow-feelings all over the world."