Bangladesh's ‘vision 2021’ at LDC meeting

Bangladesh's minister of state for foreign affairs has shared with ministers of Least Developed Countries his government’s vision to emerge as a middle-income country by 2021.

Md Shahriar Alam was speaking at a LDC ministerial meeting on “New Partnerships for building productive capacity” at Cotonou in Benin on Tuesday, the foreign ministry said.

Alam who is representing Bangladesh chaired the ‘First Thematic session’ on policy framework and institutions for productive capacity building.

The foreign ministry said Alam explained the vision and the perspectives of the government “in the context of policy framework and institutions for productive capacity building”.

Senior representatives from governments, international agencies and intergovernmental organizations spoke at the panel discussion.

The junior minister said Bangladesh being a least developed country was “well on its way to graduate and is confident to reach its target in time”.

The ruling Awami League government set the target of becoming middle-income country by 2021 when the country would celebrate 50 years of its independence.

Alam said the government was “formulating and implementing all necessary policies in its national development plans to reach the middle income status by the golden Jubilee of our independence”.

The foreign ministry said he also campaigned for Bangladesh’s candidates for the memberships in the upcoming elections of the Human Rights Council, and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) among the participating countries.

The LDC ministerial meeting began on July 28 would end Thursday.

Alam is scheduled to return home on Friday.