Planning Adviser Wahiduddin Mahmud today (18 September) said that it was Bangladesh’s family planning programme, not microcredit, that first encouraged middle-class and lower-middle-class women to work outside their homes.
“Many people don’t realize that women in these social classes began working outside not because of microcredit but because of the family planning workers who went door to door,” the adviser said during a briefing at the NEC Conference room, following the first ECNEC meeting under the interim government.
He emphasised the critical role of health workers, particularly family planning workers, in the 1980s. “They visited every household, and the program was incredibly successful, setting a global example,” he said.
Wahiduddin highlighted that Bangladesh’s family planning efforts helped significantly reduce the birth rate, an achievement unmatched by any other developing country at the time. “As birth rates declined, so did child mortality, leading to remarkable improvements in the country’s social development index,” he added.
However, the adviser expressed concern over the stagnation of progress since the program’s decline.
