Both income and consumption inequalities in Bangladesh have widened further over the past six years while poverty decreased by 5.6 percentage points in the period despite the Covid pandemic.
Income inequality in the country stood at Gini coefficient of 0.4999 in 2022, according to the key findings of the Household Income and Expenditure Survey 2022 released by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.
The overall income inequality has been widening in the country as it was at Gini coefficient of 0.482 in 2016 and 0.458 in 2010. A smaller Gini Coefficient signifies a less unequal distribution of the national wealth.
The income inequality rate has increased to 0.539 in the urban area in 2022 from 0.490 in 2016, but it decreased to 0.446 in the rural area in 2022 from 0.454 in 2016.
Economists said that it was surprising that inequality in the rural area decreased although the rate of poverty was high there.
The overall poverty dropped to 18.7 per cent at the national level from 24.3 per cent in 2016.聽
The rate of poverty in the rural area dropped to 20.5 per cent in 2022 from 24.4 per cent in 2016 while the rate in the urban area fell to 14.7 per cent in 2022 from 18.0 in 2016.
Besides, income growth was slower in the rural area than in the urban area, showed BBS HIES 2022 key findings.
Former World Bank Dhaka office chief economist Zahid Hossain said that lower income growth was associated with high poverty and low income inequality while commenting on the key findings.
He said the data looked odd.
The consumption inequality is also increasing as it rose to 0.334 in 2022 from 0.324 in 2016 and 0.321 in 2010.
Former director general of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies MK Mujeri said that inequality had reached an alarmingly dangerous level.
Policies should be devised immediately to check it, he added.
State Minister for Planning Shamsul Alam, who was present at the event, said that the findings about income and consumption inequalities were almost static.
He noted that it happened in a growing economy.
Answering a question, Alam said that the calorie intake might not have increased to the level of western countries as 鈥榦ur people do not consume wine鈥�.
Planning minister MA Mannm, while addressing the ceremony as chief guest, called the theory of 鈥榙evelopment and inequality鈥� old-fashioned.
鈥楽teps must be taken to check inequality鈥�, he said.
He also said that poverty reduction was made possible due to measures taken during the Covid pandemic. He said that Bangladesh was one of the most successful countries to have checked the pandemic.聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽聽
Economists also said that growing inequality was worrying with the growing capital flight and loan scams in the banking sector.
According to Center for Policy Dialogue distinguished fellow Mustafizur Rahman, the findings of the survey are not consistent with the government鈥檚 vision for sustainable development.
The country鈥檚 banking sector is overwhelmed with defaulted loans worth over Tk 1 lakh crore while the Global Financial Integrity, a US-based think tank, found that Bangladesh lost $8.28 billion per year on average between 2009 and 2015 due to trade misinvoicing.
The BBS survey findings also showed that the overall rate of extreme poverty was 5.6 per cent in 2022, 6.5 per cent in the rural areas and 3.8 per cent in the urban areas.
BIDS DG Dr Binayek Sen said that it was good news that the rate of poverty, including extreme poverty, was declining in the country.
鈥楶oor are now trying to become rich,鈥� he said
The daily intake of calories in the country increased over the years as it has reached 2,393 kilocalories in 2022 from 2,210.4 kilocalories in 2016 and 2,318.3 kilocalories in 2010.
The HIES 2022 showed that the average household monthly income increased in nominal terms to Tk 32,422 in 2022 from Tk 15,988 in 2016.
It also showed that the total monthly household expenditure increased to Tk 31,500 in 2022 from Tk 15,715 in 2016 and Tk 11,200 in 2010.