Bangladesh’s poverty rate reduced to 24.3% at the end of the last year from 31.55% in previous years, according to a survey report. Addressing the event, Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal claimed that the extreme poverty rate of Bangladesh was better than that of the US’ richest state, California. California’s extreme poverty rate is 16%, while that of Bangladesh was measured at 12.9% in 2016 and 17.6% in 2010. World Bank Dhaka Office’s lead economist Zahid Hussain said that though the poverty rate is dropping in Bangladesh, there is a bad news that the pace of poverty reduction is too slow compared with the period 2005-2010. According to the survey, the Gini co-efficient now stands at 0.483, while it stood at 0.458 in 2010.

Source: Dhaka Tribune October 17, 2017 19:30 UTC