Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
were in operation: Statutory Rationing for urban centers and Modified Rationing
for nonurban areas.
The focus during the Pakistan regime was on so-called protection of the
grain markets; the policy focus was on smuggling prevention, export prohibi-
tion, and restrictions on grain movements and private stocks. Although there
had been name changes of the public agencies, such as renaming the former
Civil Supply Department as the Department of Food, the broad policy frame-
work remained the same until the mid-1950s. The major instruments continued
to be the Bengal Rice Mills Control Order, Bengal Rationing Order, and the Es-
sential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Act of 1946.
During the mid-1950s, the government dismantled the rationing system,
sold off all public food stock, and retrenched all employees connected with the
system. This policy reform, however, had to be reversed following a bad
aman
(rain-fed rice) harvest combined with political agitation in January 1956 (Ahmed,
Haggblade, and Chowdhury 2000). The new regulatory framework consisted of
as many as 14 legislative acts or regulations with specific purposes, which were
not vastly different from those of the colonial days. It almost made grain trade
a government monopoly, once again reflecting the political perception of the
need for control over foodgrain markets.
Major Reforms since 1971
A summary of the major food policy reforms since 1974 is presented in Table
5.1. In terms of the whole policy cycle, the events presented in this table can be
divided into three main thematic lines: realization of the problems, experimen-
tation with alternatives, and innovations and reforms. The realization of the
problems came early on when the country witnessed an upsurge in the PFDS,
as the first government of the independent Bangladesh, led by the Awami League,
opted for expanding the rationing system. Furthermore, in the early 1970s, there
was a large influx of food, which, in the absence of other programs, was routed
through rationing channels. However, the donors soon realized the inefficiency
of the rationing system and advocated a progressive shift toward a pro-poor
policy of in-kind distribution programs. This push heralded a shift in policy fo-
cus from rationing to conditional transfer programs, which is reflected in the in-
troduction of Food-for-Work and the Vulnerable Group Development (VGD) in
1974 and 1975, respectively.
However, the issue of reducing subsidies still remained, and the Planning
Commission advocated phasing out rationing subsidies in 1978, which resulted
in various policy experimentations. One of the first actions was to link the ra-
tion price with the procurement price, which reduced rents in public distribu-
tion and ultimately made them unattractive to consumers. The other initiatives
during the 1980s included abolition of the Modified Rationing system, intro-
duction of Rural Rationing and the Rural Maintenance Program, and with-
