Bangladesh won’t graduate from the status of least developed country (LDC) before 2024. The country will be under UN observation for six years after meeting the three necessary criteria for being elevated to a developing country, according to sources at the Economic Relation Division (ERD).   

The three criteria are: per capita income, human assets and economic vulnerability. These indexes are considered by the United Nation's Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), which reviews the list of LDCs every three years and recommends the inclusion and graduation of eligible countries.

The Secretariat of the UN Committee for Development Policy (CDP) to Dhaka in mid-October last year confirmed that the country for the first time was likely to meet the three criteria for graduation at the next CDP review in March 2018.

ERD sources have clarified that the country has met the three criteria for the first time.

According to the UN’s graduation threshold set at the triennial review in 2015, the gross national income (GNI) per capita of a developing country has to be USD 1,242 or above. Bangladesh's average GNI per capita rose to USD 1,272 in the last three years.

Regarding the other two indexes, human assets and economic vulnerability, a country has to score 66 or above and 32 or below respectively. Bangladesh’s score in the human

assets index stood at 72.8, while it is 24.8 in the economic vulnerability index (EVI).

ERD officials have said that the CDP will recommend considering Bangladesh’s graduation to a developed nation at a meeting held in March this year. The CDP will submit an assessment report to the authorities concerned in this regard, the officials have added.  

A country must exceed the thresholds of two of the three criteria at two consecutive triennial reviews to be considered for graduation. Bangladesh looks likely to be the first LDC ever to graduate on the basis of all three

criteria.

Bangladesh’s success comes on the back of six straight years in which economic growth exceeded 6 per cent, culminating in some of the fastest growth rates in the world in recent years.

 The per capita gross national income has outstripped the LDC average since 1996 and recently risen above the threshold used by the CDP. The World Bank Atlas method has been used to calculate this.

According to the CDP report, the economy has developed largely on the basis of textile and garments exports. Besides, remittances, natural gas, shipbuilding and seafood, information communications and pharmaceuticals are all emerging sources of foreign exchange and economic growth.

Considerable improvement in the five main components of the human assets index – infant mortality, maternal mortality, undernourishment, adult schooling and adult literacy–means that Bangladesh has exceeded the threshold on this index for the first time in 2016, the CDP report pointed out.

ERD officials have said after observing the trend for three years, the CDP in 2021 will recommend the UN general assembly to recognise Bangladesh as a developing country. Then the UN will observe Bangladesh for the next three years and see if the country remains unchanged on the basis of these three criteria till 2024.

If Bangladesh still meets the three criteria, the UN will promptly announce its elevation to the status of a developing country