Bangladesh lessons

SHAQ Dar’s visit to Dhaka promises a reset in our relationship with Bangladesh. This is a welcome development. We would do well to enter this new phase of the relaMuhammad Yunus tionship with some humility.

- BY Iyaz NaBI

We may have improved our international profile in defence capability, but economically there is still much to be done —and indeed learnt from Bangladesh. A critical area for emulation is population management. A recent meeting of experts, chaired by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, clearly brought home the threat posed by rapid population growth. It was agreed that it is akin to running fast to stay in the same place, and that we need to get off this awful treadmill as soon as possible.

Several years ago, Dr Zafarullah Chowdhry, who was to Bangladesh health what Prof Muhammad Yunus is to microfinance, was invited to Lahore by the then Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif. In his speech, Dr Chowdhry said that Bangladesh had benefited from Ayub Khan’s family planning programme. With half our population growth now, clearly Bangladesh learnt much while we unlearnt.

Population growth is determined by the fertility rate (the number of children born to a woman of childbearing age) which, in turn, is driven by the contraceptive prevalence rate. Thus, the desire to have fewer children manifests itself in the desire to use contraceptives. With twice Bangladesh’s population growth, our contraceptive prevalence rate is half. Programmes to manage population growth thus have to focus on increasing the contraceptive prevalence rate.