Since the last few years, this open-ended strategy has changed in character and acquired a more accountable mechanism. This in turn has led to charges of interference in our internal affairs. Nevertheless, this transformation has not affected the principle of several countries and institutions continuing to participate as development partners in our economic evolution.

Today, the response-strategy for development partners of Bangladesh relates mostly to their commitment to a global partnership for development and in working towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In other words, it is focussed on the strategy that seeks to reduce poverty through rapid economic growth and greater inclusion and empowerment of the poor. In this context, they give special attention to the PRSP (Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper) document prepared by the Government of Bangladesh (GOB) with regard to various aspects of poverty reduction and economic development. This includes the promotion of trade and investment, human development, especially of the poor, the provision of effective safety net measures and care for the environment.

The donors (both country-based as well multilateral organisations), as development partners, are also working out how they can support Bangladesh and, at the same time, address the issues of governance that are essential for further growth and sustainable economic development, specially in administrative capacity building in the sectors of education and health.

The donors are currently focussing on: (a) GOB's commitment to ensuring participation, social inclusion and empowerment of ethnic minorities and in addressing the needs of the disabled and other marginalised groups; (b) discrimination against women as an intrinsic component of poverty; (c) integration of gender issues into all donor-supported programmes, including elimination of gender disparity in socio-economic development, political, human and judicial rights; (d) the risk being faced by Bangladesh in general from climate change and that by the vulnerable poor in particular. They are, in this regard, also looking at the probable effects of long term changes and the increasing risk of extreme weather events. Such assessments, they feel, will enable them to include pro-poor environmental issues in their programmes; and (c) in the creation of an effective food security programme.

In the contemporary world, donors consider improved governance as being central to the delivery of pro-poor growth and the efficiency of donor aid. They are consequently giving special emphasis on the needs of the poor in the following key areas: better service delivery, particularly in education and health; accountability, reduction of leakages; access to justice; regulatory support, particularly to the informal sectors of the economy and reduction of the threat of income erosion. To this has been added the basic requirements of increasing the State's efficiency in supporting growth and increased democratisation of the discourse and practice of power.

The donors are also now taking a holistic approach in the gender sector and associated income generation. Earlier, donors had supported small programmes in this sector, resulting in dispersed actions rather than broader programmes with systemic impact. Now they are taking a more systematic approach and grounding all their programming to the increase of effectiveness of institutions. They are also emphasising not only on reducing leakages but also on improving the regulatory environment, with a view to facilitating the growth of export-oriented trade and FDI.

In addition, the donor community has shown keen interest to assist in another significant aspect of the PRSP -- criminal justice, local governance, and corruption. In this area, the EU and others are trying to pool funding arrangements for addressing corruption through agreed benchmarks. This approach is still experimental in nature but definitely interesting. They are also making an effort to develop their support for decentralisation and local governance with specific linkage to pro-poor programmes related to environment, sanitation, availability of clean drinking water and food security.

The donor community and the GOB, both realise that trade is better than aid. This view has been facilitated by the positive effects of rapid industrialisation in India, China, Korea and South-East Asia. Consequently, industry and private-sector led growth for exports have become the dominant strategy to create more employment opportunities. Trans-national corporations from North America and Western Europe are also being encouraged to enter the market and give a big push with their capital, technology and management inflows. As a result of this development, the donor community is carefully ascertaining the areas, where broad-based association can be of the greatest benefit. Particularly the EU, the largest trading partner of Bangladesh, has facilitated the process by providing duty-free and quota-free access to Bangladeshi products. They have also as trade related technical assistance given Bangladesh financial support of Euro 63 million. This has been done in particular not only to facilitate trade diversification but also to assist in overcoming the negative impact of the phasing out of the quota regime under the agreement on textiles and clothing. They are doing so because they realise the importance of this sector with regard to employment and gender activity. While doing so, the EU is also stressing on the need for Bangladesh to further develop core labour standards and environment values.

Other donors are also actively engaged in several programmes related to: addressing the regulatory environment and removing indirect and direct trade tariff barriers; increasing the competitiveness of the business sector, particularly SMEs; facilitating export diversification and export growth; and increasing the productivity of the workforce through skill development and improved working conditions.

The donors are also involved in human development in Bangladesh. Aware of the importance of competition in industrial success, the donors are also focussing on a shift in their education support to skills development and employability at the post-primary level as a coherent linkage to trade technical support activities. In particular, they want to improve standards of literacy that are required for successful skills development at the post-primary level. They hope that this will enhance synergies and mutual benefits for overall human development. They also know that this format has several spillover effects leading to improved health, hygiene and reproductive knowledge and behaviour.

As will be clear from the above, the intended area of cooperation is complex and demanding. It assumes greater difficulty, given the various challenges to our developmental efforts, enumerated thus: competing areas of international interest; donor fatigue in traditional support areas; inability to complete the process of accountable expenditure; lack of political steadfastness and political interference; over bureaucratisation in project implementation; bottlenecks of regulatory nature significantly affecting qualitative improvement; lack of harmonisation and coordination; deterioration in the quality of public institutions; corruption and lack of transparency in decision making; lack of preparedness at the community level; inability to provide at times promised local matching funds for approved projects; absence of proper governance and effective implementation; inability to achieve thematic and geographical complementarities which in turn leads to duplication; and lack of coherence in programming associated with poor local governance and administration.

Nevertheless, I believe that these tests have to be faced and overcome by the policy planners in Bangladesh. Unless this is done, effective participation by the development partners in the future will be that much less meaningful.

Muhammad Zamir is a former Secretary and Ambassador who can be reached at mzamir@dhaka.net