Increase allocation for poverty alleviation

Though our government's current allocation for social safety net programmes is 2.2 percent of the GDP, in reality, it is about 0.77 percent for core social protection programmes. It is clear that this allocation is not enough for achieving the goal of the government to bring down the number of people living in extreme poverty by 2021. It is said that more than 25 percent of the total population lives in poverty in the country and around 11 percent in extreme poverty surviving on less than $1.25 per day. Economists suggest that we allocate more money for the core social protection programmes to achieve zero extreme poverty in the projected time. We hope the government will follow this suggestion.

Mobarak Ali, Gopibagh, Dhaka