Urbanization Scenario in Bangladesh

Bangladesh is one of the world’s most densely populated country and has also faced rapid
population growth throughout the last century although the population growth rate has somewhat decreased to a moderate level in recent times.

Bangladesh’s urban population has been growing at a yearly average rate of 6 percent since independence, at a time when the national population growth was 2.2 percent. As a result, urban population has grown six-fold, compared with a 70 percent increase in rural population (World Bank, 2007). As per recent UN data, approximately 25 percent of Bangladesh’s current population currently lives in urban areas. Of this urban population, more than half lives in the four largest cities: Dhaka, Chittagong, Khulna and Rajshahi. With a population of almost 12 million, Dhaka is the capital and largest city in Bangladesh. It is also the 11th city in the world. At the same time, it is consistently ranked as one of the world’s least livable city. Although income growth is higher and the poverty incidence is lower than the rest of Bangladesh, Dhaka still is a low income city with large numbers of poor when compared with most mega cities of the world. Holding the prospects for better income opportunities than most parts of Bangladesh, rapid migration is causing Dhaka’s population to grow much faster than the rest of the country. This fast urbanization is putting pressure on the city’s limited land, an already fragile environment, and weak urban services. The population density is now believed to have reached around 34000 people per square kilometer, making Dhaka amongst the most densely populated city in the world. 

The level of urbanization of Bangladesh in last three decades was influenced by rural to urban migration, availability of economic and social opportunities in the urban areas, territorial expansion of existing urban centers and natural growth of the population in urban centers. Some of the characteristics of urbanization in Bangladesh are as follows:

•  A very large urban population of the country is concentrated in only six major metropolitan cities of the country. Dhaka alone holds about 70% of the total urban population.

•  Very rapid growth of metropolitan cities, particularly of Dhaka the capital and largest city. The population of Dhaka is now over 13.0 million

•  Environment and socio-economic conditions in urban poor settlements in cities have not improved as expected.

• There are gross inequalities in the socio-economic opportunities and services within urban areas.

•  Most of the poor people cannot manage to meet their minimum basic needs i.e., food, shelter, clothing, health and education with their personal income.

•  Urban traffic has reached nightmare proportions, often causing huge delays in covering small distances with associated productivity losses 
• Water and air pollution from poor waste and traffic management poses serious health risks. The already acute slum population is growing further, contributing to serious human and law and order problems

It is also a known fact that the urban poor are playing vital role in urban economy and they are the part and parcel of the large flourishing informal economy. Taking Dhaka city as an example, almost 70% of the population is from the ‘low income’ sector. Yet, this population only has access to about 20% of the land in Dhaka. This highlights the unfavorable climate that exists with regards to ‘land tenure’. Most of the low income settlements do not have adequate access to legal water supply (only around 50% have access)’ and ‘electricity (only around 30% have informal connections). Sanitation and drainage is another major problem where only 30% of these families have some sort of drainage and only 20% to some form of sanitary latrines. This results in disease and other health ailments.

On the other hand, this rapid urban growth has brought economic and socio-cultural improvements for some people and the overall urban environment yet to improve to a desired level. The World Bank announced in June 2013 that Bangladesh had reduced the number of people living in poverty from 63 million in 2000 to 47 million in 2010, despite a total population that had grown to approximately 150 million. This means that Bangladesh will reach its first United Nations-established Millennium Development Goal, that of poverty reduction, one years ahead of the 2015 deadline. Bangladesh is also making progress in reducing its poverty rate to 26 percent of the population. Since the 1990s, there has been a declining trend of poverty by 1 percent each year, with the help of international assistance.

The implications of such urbanization are manifested in poverty, inequality, high unemployment, underemployment or miss employment, over-crowded housing and proliferation of slums and squatters, deterioration in the environmental conditions, inadequate supply of clean water, incidence of diseases, over-crowding in schools and hospitals, and over-loading in public transports and increase in traffic jams, road accidents, crimes and social tensions. These are the characteristics of nearly all urban centers of Bangladesh, including the largest metropolitan cities, particularly Dhaka, where the rates of growth are the fastest even up to 10% annually. 

Source: 

• Public Policies on Urban and Housing in Bangladesh, The Context Governance , By, Dr. Khondaker Showkat Hossain 
•  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_Bangladesh