While Bangladesh is far from the dark days of famine, access to a nutritious diet is still far from a reality for the majority of the population, and, according to experts, nutritious food will remain a luxury for the general public unless the skyrocketing prices of commodities are brought under control.
Given the fact that the very basis of our economy lies in agriculture, this is nothing if not a failure of the administration to live up to our legacy.
While the administration has, in the recent past, pledged support in ensuring food security by producing as much food as possible, it has yet to translate into reality, at least as far as a nutritious diet is concerned. We still need to increase crop intensity and diversity to a point where it meets the needs of our population, and the only way that can be achieved is through further modernization of our agriculture technologies.
Food might not be a scarce resource anymore, but quality and access still remain issues that the government will have to focus on more as Bangladesh inexorably marches towards middle-income status. According to an FAO report from last year, Bangladesh has a severe deficiency in protein and micronutrient intake, as the people’s daily intake of dairy and dairy products, pulses, meat and eggs is way below the standard requirement.
The statistics for vegetable intake is perhaps even more appalling: Where the recommended intake is 300g per day for a person, in Bangladesh the average intake is only 167.39g per day.
There are no two ways about it, we need to empower our agriculture sector, more specifically our farmers with key innovations in the sector. A healthy diet should not be a matter of affordability as everyone deserves to live a healthy life.
