Dhaka, from the air

Since the inception of Bangladesh, the country has received approximately US$40 billion in foreign aid. Today it’s pleasing to acknowledge that economic progress is being made and things are heading in a good direction, despite some unfathomable hindrances and political mismanagement.

In the early days, the country in fact shunned foreign money under the direction of Mujib, and then nationalised a great deal of its industries under his socialist whims, a burden that future political leaders had to painfully shed, with one notable example being the death of Bangladesh’s jute industry in the last decade. Zia, on the other hand, used foreign money to incite economic growth, including the introduction of new infrastructure to aid the process. On balance, foreign aid dependence is now slowly decreasing and Bangladesh’s development initiatives have met with mixed successes.

Development and the evolution of its concepts have long been tied to the fate and history of modern Bangladesh. Any discussion of its effects will be laced with opinions on whether the aid enterprise – and the billions of dollars associated with it – have been effective in improving the conditions of Bangladesh’s millions.

On one hand, 1971 saw a broken, war-battered country with a massive population and no resources or infrastructure to speak of. The government had not yet stabilised, and the billions of aid dollars that poured in surely did land in the pockets of corrupt officials.