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Bangladesh Ambassador to China Muhammad Azizul Haque (LI FANGFANG) |
The proportion of people living under the poverty line in Bangladesh has been reduced to 28 percent in recent years, a huge change compare the 40 percent recorded in 2005, according to Bangladesh Ambassador to China Muhammad Azizul Haque.
Haque made the remards at a seminar themed "Socioeconomic Achievements of Bangladesh in Recent Years" in Beijing on December 5.
Political, business and cultural experts present at the seminar reviewed the country's socioeconomic changes as the Bangladeshi ambassador delivered his keynote speech.
In the past five years, Bangladesh has achieved self-sufficient food production and decent food safety, also eliminating illiteracy at the same time through various measures including providing free textbooks for school children all over the country. The government also provided a monthly subsidy of 30-kilograms of grain for 7 million women living in poverty, 80,000 of whom were also given access to two-year vocational training classes.
While many developed countries worry about low GDP growth, Bangladesh has maintained a yearly growth of 6.38 percent for five years. Their per capita income increased from $676 in 2009 to $1,044 this year, with export earnings growing substantially up to $27.03 billion during the fiscal year 2012-2013.
Besides economic development, Bangladesh puts great effort in cultural and academic exchanges. A famous example is Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), the first Asian Nobel Laureate in Literature, who wrote in Bangali.
Scholars and students from Bangladesh and China have communicated extensively in recent years, according to Zhang Xin, a scholar with Peking University. "With the joint efforts of the two countries, people-to-people exchanges and other intellectual communications will surely be promoted in the future," Zhang said.
"Everybody sees China as a true friend of Bangladesh," said Zhou Gang, former Chinese Ambassador to India who had also served in Chinese Embassy in Bangladesh in the 1970s. "I hope the friendly people of Bangladesh can enjoy peace, stability and progress," Zhou added. |