The continuing deterioration of law and order has been attributed to weak governance, criminalisation of politics, corruption, violation of citizen rights, break-down of traditional moral order and intolerance marked by violence and insecurity -- with just negative impacts on poverty reduction efforts.

There is, of course, an extensive range of formal rights reflecting a progressive liberal constitution that establishes state commitment to Universal Human Rights. In practice, however, the ability to enjoy rights depends upon who you are, how much you can 'afford' and whom you know. In this existing 'system', the have-nots face innumerable barriers when attempting to obtain access to services, resources and livelihood opportunities.

Monopolistic state service providers, an underdeveloped private sector characterised by extensive market failure and segmentation, and pervasive patron-client relationship structure sustain poverty and inequality along class and gender lines. Political parties are generally more dependent on local and national elites who mobilise their dependent clients, rather than on independent 'voting power' of deprived masses e.g. landless poor. As a result, politicians are unlikely to hold officials to account or press for pro-poor reform, and often have a vested interest in the accumulation of resources and power by elites.

The landless poor face so many depressing constraints in their struggle for a decent livelihood. The nature and magnitude of these obstacle often also determine the ways for dealing with the challenge of poverty. Such barriers are, of course, not immutable and they can change over time in their intensity and significance.

If we review our poverty situation in terms of income poverty and human poverty what we find? As per HIES-2000 (Households Income and Expenditure Survey) report, 49.8 percent of total population (53 percent rural) is income poor in Bangladesh. It indicates modest poverty reduction rate of 1 percent point per year. Again, the human poverty is 35 percent indicating modest decline rate of 2.5 percent per year. As per the 'Government Agriculture Census Report', 57.5 percent of total population is landless. The landless possess no viable means to reduce their poverty.

The secretary general of Bangladesh Economic Association Prof. Abul Barkat stated in his paper 'Power, Politics and Poverty in Bangladesh' that 'the issue of poverty needs to be viewed in relation to deprivation: Poor people are caught in the deprivation trap, and true human development requires breaking the trap by empowering the excluded -- poor and deprived; focusing on human freedom in contrast with narrower views of development such as identifying development with the growth of gross national product, or with the rise in personal income, or with industrialisation, or with technological advance, or with modernisation. Growth of GNP or of individual incomes can be important as means to expanding freedoms enjoyed by the members of the society. But freedom depends also on other determinants, such as social and economic arrangements as well as political and civil rights'.

There is divergence of socio-economic, political and cultural factors involved with the poverty issue. Poverty itself has different dimensions. Therefore, no approach would be effective the issue is address from different directions. The poor people need support not only for increasing income but also for meeting other basic needs like housing, health, education and social justice. As majority of the population is dependent on agriculture, therefore people need access to land, water bodies and other public resources -- means of production. Poverty reduction needs holistic approach considering socio-political and economic contexts. However, in the past decades, we had addressed poverty only from the perspective of income poverty; we did not give emphasise on human poverty and other perspectives. As a result, we did not make significant progress in poverty reduction as well as overall development of the country.

Recently, Bangladesh organised the largest ever regional Micro-credit Summit in Dhaka, where more than 1200 delegates from 47 countries attended and hundreds of them made visits to some local micro-credit organisations. In his message, the UN Secretary General told that micro-credit and microfinance programmes have proven to be effective in the fight against poverty as they addressed the problems at the grassroots level.

As observed, it seems that micro-credit is the only way to the third world countries to reduce their poverty as well as achieving sustainable economic growth. However, those who are directly working with the landless people (majority population in the country) in the rural areas may have different opinion about it. It is true that grassroots people need money for involving themselves in income generating activities in order to reduce their poverty and unemployment. But not in that form, it needs to be a comprehensive social package so that they can be the owner of resources and utilise the resources through investing credit. Then there will be the sustainable development.

Over the last three decades, GO & NGOs invested thousands of crores of taka in the credit programme for economic emancipation of the people and argument was that if any one could be economically empowered then he/she would be able to manage other resources/facilities like health, nutrition, education etc. However, field experience shows that micro-credit has achieved success to a certain extent; it successfully created 'safety net' rather than achieving sustainable development.

In the short run, it increases income of some moderate poor, but it there is no insurance that it will sustain through the future. Again, due to certain procedures, it has not covered the majority people, the homeless and the landless living in the remote areas, eg char land. It did not as yet significantly contribute to reduce human poverty in the country. Again, it could be found that there are huge number families who failed to repay the loan due to its high rate of interest or lack of opportunity to invest so profitably or spending money on social occasions. Finally, they migrated to nearby cities or Dhaka adding to the slum problems.

In other words, economic development/emancipation should not be equated simply with 'creation of low income job opportunity' or 'increase of individual income to certain extent'. Most of the economists in the country argued that the problem of poverty / development is structural and it should be addressed as such.

So, considering the constraints, we should rethink our development approach and give equal emphasis and importance to income, human development and structural issues for overall sustainable development of the society. We should put all emphasis on only micro-credit. We conclude recalling Amartya Sen's statement that development means expansion of capabilities. In other words, it is increasing the possibilities for more people to realise their potentials through expansion of their capabilities for functioning.

Md Abdul Kader is Executive Director and Sohel Ibn Ali is Director of Samata.