Former Governor of Bangladesh Bank Dr. Atiur Rahman. BBN file photo.
Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) - The Bangladesh Development Story is indeed fascinating and still unfolding, former governor of Bangladesh Bank (BB) Atiur Rahman has said.
“The 35 billion US dollar economy in the mid-1990s has expanded to nearly 300 billion US dollars. This has been possible due to deep aspirations of the people who are so innovative”, Dr. Rahman said on Friday while chairing the first plenary session on ‘Bangladesh in the next 30 years: challenges and prospects’ of the fifth Bangladesh Development Initiative Conference at the Yale University in the USA.
BDI President Professor Munir Quddus welcomed the delegates from all around the world. Dr. Mustafizur Rahman from CPD and Dr. Nazrul Islam from UNDESA participated in the panel discussion, according to a message, received in Dhaka on Saturday.
Dr. Rahman further said that Bangladesh is going through a number of simultaneous transitions like industrialization, urbanization, demographic and technological transformations which require well coordinated navigation through better governance.
“The future will be all about digitization, innovations by tech-savvy small and medium enterprises, overpowering role of the private sector in achieving climate adaptive inclusive growth process,” the senior economist explained.
Both the panelists also emphasized on reforms in governance including desired decentralization, export diversification and environmental resource management, he added.
Participants expressed their concerns about rising inequality and low quality education. As such the high level of educated unemployment remains a big headache for the policy makers, they said.
Dr. Rahman winded up the session by putting emphasis on the quality execution of the projects to sustain the growth process more cost efficiently.
He also asked relevant stakeholders to help small and medium enterprises to have greater access to training, finance and market to expedite inclusive growth process in the future.
BBN/SSR/AD