mdg progress report

8/13/2019 MDG Progress Report

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Introduction

The Millennium Development Goal (also referred to as MDG) reflect a set of actions and targets

contained in the Millennium Declaration that was adopted by 193 nations in 2002 based on the

Millennium Declaration agreed in September 2000. Along with the 193 United Nations

Members, at least 23 international organizations have agreed to achieve these goals by the year

2015. There are eight goals with 21 targets and a series of measurable health and economic

indicators for each target.

The goals are:

1. Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger,

2. Achieving universal primary education,

3. Promoting gender equality and empowering women,

4. Reducing child mortality rates,

5. Improving maternal health,

6. Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases,

7. Ensuring environmental sustainability, and

8. Developing a global partnership for development

Bangladesh has already achieved considerable success in 6 goals. Bangladesh has recorded

impressive feats in pulling people out of poverty, ensuring that more children, girls and boys,

attend school, and have access to clean water. Considerable progress has been made in child

survival rate. There have been some improvements to address the country‟s massive

environmental challenges over the past decade as well. Out of the 52 MDG targets, Bangladesh

is on track on 19 of them; and 14 of them need attention (2011 data). (MDGs & Bangladesh,

UNDP)

Although many of the goals have been achieved, Bangladesh is still a long way from fulfilling all

the targets by 2015. In fact given the current situation the feat is not possible by 2015. This

report is to analyze the Goal 3: “Promoting Gender equality and empowering women” and gauge

the amount of success that the country has had in this sector and also find out about the

shortcomings.



MDG 3:

MDG 3 is the goal of promoting gender equality and empowering women.

The goal is: “Promote Gender Equali ty & Empower Women ”

The target is: „Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by

2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015‟.

The indicators are:

3.1a. Ratio of girls to boys in primary education (1:1)

3.1b. Ratio of girls to boys in secondary education (target 1:1)

3.1c. Ratio of girls to boys in tertiary education. (Target 1:1)

3.2. Share of women in wage employment in non-agricultural sector (target 50%)

3.3. Proportion of seats held by women in national parliament. (Target 33%)

Of these indicators Bangladesh has achieved the goal of gender parity in primary and secondary

education. The ratio of girls to boys in primary education is 1.02:1, and in secondary education is

1.14:1.In case of other indicators Bangladesh has made some improvement but the country is still

a far away from reaching the target. The current status of ratio of girls to boys in tertiary

education is 0.39:1, which is far away from the targeted 1:1 ratio. The share of wage

employment of women is 19.87% in non-agricultural sector and proportion of seats held by

women in parliament is 19.71%, somewhat closer to 33% than from the year 1990-91 when it

was 12.7%. All the status of the previous, current and targeted percentages is presented below in

Table: 1:



Success in Primary and Secondary Education:

Education is the biggest indicator when gauging gender equality in any locality or country. So

the first three indicators of MDG 3 are related with education. We have seen in Table: 1 that

Bangladesh has already met two goals out of the 5 in MDG 3. It has been a gradual process and

took at least 15 years for Bangladesh to meet them. Looking at some of the data below, we can

see a clear improvement:

Table 2: Female Students Enrolment in Primary School

Year Total Students Percentage of total

Students

1990 84,81,196 45%1995 89,02,281 47%

2000 89,45,250 49%

2005 84,46,486 50.7

Table 3: Percentage of Female Students in Secondary School

Year Percentage of Total Students

1991 34%1999 51%2000 52%

2005 53.3%

Source: (BANBEIS, 2006)

This gradual increase of girls attending primary school was largely because of the

implementation of The First Primary Education Program (PEDP I) in 1990

And Second Primary Education Development Program (PEDP II). On the other hand the Female

Secondary School Assistance Program (FSSAP) launched in late 1980‟s and nationally covered

in early 1990‟s drastically increased the number of girls participating in secondary schooling .

The program basically encouraged girls to continue school after primary level by providing

stipend. The project was largely successful as it nearly doubled the number of female attendance

in schools within a space of 7 years. Today 53.31% of total students enrolled in secondary leverare girls.



Indicators Needing Attention:

Tertiary Education:

The target was to ensure equal number of female students as the male student. Bangladesh is

supposed to reach the target no later than 2015. But unlike primary and secondary education

female enrollment has decreased in tertiary level. Female enrollment has decreased from 31% to

24% from 1997 to 2005. In 2004 only 24% students in tertiary level were female. In the last few

years enrollment of female students in tertiary level has increased. At present (2010)female

students comprise 39% of total students in tertiary level. Increase in the number of private

universities is a big reason behind this increase. The government can increase female enrollment

by offering stipend as it did for secondary level female students through a program like FSSAP.

Adult literacy:

Another indicator for MDG 3 is adult literacy rate. Bangladesh is supposed to achieve an equal

male female ratio in adult literacy by 2015. In 2005 57.6% adult male were literate whereas

47.9% female were literate. The percentage of literate female has increased since 1991 (25.8%).

In 2010 the percentage was 52.2% for women and 61.3% still leaving females 9% less than

males. The government needs to improve the percentage of female to ensure equal ratio.

Employment of woman in non-agriculture sector:

The main target was to ensure equal employment, which the government has not achieved yet.

In 1995-1996 of the total employed adults only 20% were female and the rest were male. In

unlike other fields like primary and secondary education participation of woman has decreased in

the next decade. In 2005-2006 only 15% of the total employed persons were woman. But the rate

increased again and reached to 19% in 2010. To increase their participation in workforce both

the public and private sector should come forward and work according to the proposals in PRSP2 and the National Policies for the Advancement of Women 2008.

Women in parliament:



To achieve this target Bangladesh has to ensure that 33% of its member of parliament is woman.

Though the Prime minister and opposition leader of the country are women, women‟s

participation in the parliament is not satisfactory. In the election of 1991 only 42 seats were

occupied by women (of which 30 seats were reserved for women). In 1996 the number increased

to 43 but it became 42 in 2001 election. At present there are 69 female members in Bangladesh.

Though Bangladesh has not achieved the desired number female members are holding important

positions like Prime minister, Foreign minister, Opposition leader etc. Again female candidates

are getting more votes in local elections. So we can say that the number of female members in

parliament will increase in the next election.

Recommendation:Bangladesh has achieved substantial targets in MDG 3. But they are still lagging behind. But we

believe that the amount of progress made in the last 5 years is very encouraging and if continued

we can meet a lot of our goals by 2015. There are some key issues we identified in our research

and if properly implemented, they can help Bangladesh‟s chance of achieving MDG-3 by 2020.

The lack of involvement of females in tertiary education is partially due to barriers

related to cultural problems such as marital age issues, patriarchal viewpoints, etc.Government led awareness programs should be implemented and incentive packages

could be devised to address these issues and remove such barriers.

Social safety nets are programs seeking to prevent the vulnerable to shocks from falling below a certain level of vulnerability or risk. "Allowance to Widows and Destitute

Women" and "Maternity Allowance to Poor Mothers" are some of the programs, which

provide financial security to a large number of poor women, and conduct training programs in income generating activities. However, such programs have not been carried

out to a sufficient degree in Bangladesh, with certain regions of the country specially

lagging behind. Greater emphasis should be put on implementing such social safety nets.

Practices, which stop women from getting equal, wage and discourage their involvement

in the labor force, root from a number of harmful cultural practices and a patriarchal

attitude. The government should encourage greater partnership building between

MOWCA (Ministry of Women and Children Affairs) and development organizations, sothat long-term and intensive countrywide programs can be executed that would reduce

such practices through awareness. - the government should strengthen efforts that will

ensure greater implementation and adoption of laws and policies aimed at promotinggender equality and women empowerment. There is a lack of implementation concerning

The National Policy for Women's Advancement 2011.



Legal, medical and psychosocial services need to be introduced to provide immediate

relief, rehabilitation and protection of the survivors of discrimination, violence and

trafficking.

The government needs to further equip the concerned bodies, which are at the forefront

of government led activities. The JMS (Jatiya Mohila Shangstha), DWA (Department ofWomen Affairs) and MOWCA (Ministry of Women and Children Affairs), are three such

organizations. This could be done through capacity building programs for system

strengthening, conducting quality surveys, studies and research, and promoting effective

use of data.

Reference:

BibliographyBANBEIS. (2006). Bangladesh Education Statistics, BANBEIS.

Financial express, R. (n.d.). financial express. Retrieved april 2, 2013, from www.thefinancialexpress-

bd.com: http://www.thefinancialexpress-

bd.com/index.php?ref=MjBfMDFfMTBfMTNfMV8yXzE1NjMyMA==

Halim, P. D. (2007). A Situation Analysis Report on Gender MDG 3 Bangladesh. Dhaka: GeneralEconomics Division, Planning Commission,Government of the People's Reoublic of Bangladesh & UNDP

Bangladesh.

MDGs & Bangladesh, UNDP. (n.d.). Retrieved from United Nations Development Program Website:

http://www.undp.org.bd/mdgs.php

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