Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has vowed to ensure social protection of the country's people through developing rural economy across the country.

"To ensure the success of our social safety net programmes in poverty reduction, our government is determined to boost economic growth and promote a more equitable distribution of income,” she told the inaugural session of a high level conference yesterday.

The two-day conference on 'Scaling up social protection in Bangladesh: Providing ladders out of poverty and social safety nets’ was held in the city's Ruposhi Bangla Hotel.

The Planning Division arranged the conference in collaboration with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Department for International Development (DFID), Australian Aid, UKAID and World Food Programme.

The conference aims to shed light on the role of social protection in Bangladesh in promoting inclusive growth and securing people against risks.

Addressing the opening session, the PM urged the development partners including the UNDP to continue their support towards Bangladesh in developing and implementing the strategies set out in the Sixth Five-Year Plan (SFYP).

She mentioned that the government expanded the social safety net projects to 84 this fiscal, costing the national exchequer an estimated Tk 226 billion, which is 2.51 percent of the GDP.

During the last fiscal year, the government spent Tk 209 billion in implementing 82 such projects, she said.

Hasina said the projects aim to provide direct support to more than half of the country's population who are in need of aid and thus facilitating their transformation towards middle income status. The programmes are also supportive of the Millennium Development Goals.

She said, despite the recent global economic downturn, Bangladesh was able to maintain 6.7 percent growth rate in the last fiscal while aiming for 7 percent growth this year.

“Our SFYP covering the period 2011-2015 is designed to achieve eight percent growth in 2015,” she said.

Referring to data from the Household Income and Expenditure Survey, 2011, the PM said coverage of the safety net programmes has improved.

“Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics cites this as a major factor in reducing poverty rate from 40 percent to 31 percent of the population,” she added.

With Planning Minister Air-Vice Marshal (Retd) A K Khandaker in the chair, the session was also addressed, among others, by UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh NealWalker.

In his speech, Neal Walker reiterated UN's commitment to poverty reduction and highlighted the emerging role of social protection around the globe to reduce poverty and promoting social inclusion.

Walker appreciated Bangladesh's impressive success in implementing effective social protection programmes.

Meanwhile, DFID country representative Gwen Hines said, “Social protection will make a significant contribution to overcoming extreme and chronic poverty in Bangladesh and to strengthening the basis for continued and broadbased economic growth.”