Bangladesh poverty assessment: assessing a decade of progress in reducing poverty, 2000-2010
Throughout the 2000-2010 decade, Bangladesh experienced steady and strong GDP growth of nearly 6 percent per year on average. During this period, poverty rates also demonstrated an impressive steady improvement, falling by about 1.7 percentage points per year. Using data from the Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES), a joint product of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics and the World Bank, this report shows that, while 49 percent of Bangladeshis were poor in 2000, this percentage had dropped to 31.5 by 2010. In addition, Bangladesh also achieved better health outcomes, improved living conditions for the poor, lower childhood mortality, increased under-five vaccination rates for all children, increased literacy rates, and improved safety net coverage. The analysis of the 2000-2010 period presented in this report finds that poverty reduction was closely linked to growth in labor income and demographic changes. It also shows that the sources of income growth varied significantly between the first and the second halves of the 2000-2010 decade.