Weekly Bangladesh Policy Outlook: Analysis, Truth, Debate.
Speaking after the inauguration of an orientation course for 49th BCS general education cadre officers at the Rural Development Academy in Bogura on Tuesday, 13 October, Education Minister Dr A.N.M. Ehsanul Hoque Milon outlined a new approach to SSC failure. Students who fail in up to two subjects would sit a retake within 15 days…
Read More “Vocational Education Should Be a Choice, not a Consequence of Failure” »
Few partnerships have shaped Bangladesh’s development as quietly and consistently as the one with Japan. Long recognized as one of the country’s largest development partners, Tokyo has historically financed the physical arteries of the economy, from roads and power plants to the Dhaka Metro Rail and the Matarbari deep seaport. Today, that relationship is shifting…
Read More “From Concrete to Code: How Bangladesh and Japan Can Build a Lasting Digital Future” »
The signing of an agreement between Bangladesh and DP World to run the New Mooring Container Terminal in Chattogram may further enhance the trade competitiveness in the port. But foreign management cannot assure low logistics costs or boost local businesses. The economic issue is whether operational improvements trickle down to the exporters, importers, workers and…
Read More “Bangladesh’s DP World Deal Must Deliver More Than Faster Containers” »
Bangladesh’s new Chinese loan for Mongla Port should not be reduced to a convenient political label. The serious question is whether the $335.78 million concessional facility from China’s Export-Import Bank represents strategic infrastructure finance, disguised support for Chinese contractors, or a future pressure point for Bangladesh’s debt management. ¹ The answer is not binary. This…
Read More “Mongla Port Loan, Strategy, Debt and Bangladesh’s Execution Test” »
Bangladesh has brought almost every child into primary school and has narrowed the gender gap in enrolment. Learning is another matter. A pupil in a well-equipped Dhaka school and a child in a char, haor or hill village are getting very different educations. Education works like public infrastructure, because its worth depends on everyone being…
Every day, millions of people in Bangladesh make a quiet decision: find a toilet or wait. A garment worker waits for her text permitted break. A schoolgirl waits until she gets home. A bus driver waits through hours of traffic. Though occasional waiting does little harm, but done routinely, holding urine is associated with urinary…
Bangladesh has cut poverty, expanded schooling and reduced maternal deaths, yet half of its young women still marry as children. The 1993 to 94 demographic surveys found that 73 percent of women aged 20 to 24 had married before 18. By 2022 the figure was 51 percent, a fall of only 22 points in nearly…
Read More “The Law Says Eighteen. Why Do Half of Bangladesh’s Young Women Still Marry Earlier?” »
Bangladesh’s conflict zones are not one place but several: the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the Teknaf and Naikhongchhari frontier facing Rakhine, the Rohingya camps of Cox’s Bazar, and the long boundary with India. Their residents face overlapping insecurities: militarized administration, armed group activity, land disputes, border violence and the burden of hosting displaced people. Constitutional guarantees…
Read More “Citizens at the Edge: Protecting Rights in Bangladesh’s Borderlands” »
Matiur Rahman’s article, “How much longer must we wait for press freedom?”, is an abridged version of a speech he gave at the Bay of Bengal Conversation 2026. The editor and publisher of Prothom Alo traces his demand for a free press from a student protest on February 1, 1962, to the present day. He…
Read More “A Credible Cry for Press Freedom, and the Questions It Leaves Open” »
A comparative follow up to “Bangladesh’s Path to Sustainable Agricultural Transformation,” Oniket Bulletin, June 6, 2026 Two Rice Nations at Different Stages The original article argues that Bangladesh must shift from chasing immediate yield gains to a sustainable, inclusive, and resilient model of agriculture. It points to shrinking arable land, soil degradation, groundwater stress, and…
Read More “Bangladesh and Thailand: Technology, Sustainability, and the Future of Farming” »
