Located around the confluence of the mighty Ganges and Jamuna Rivers, Bangladesh is the eastern half of historic Bengal. Most of the country is composed of fertile alluvial plains; the north and northeast are mountainous, as is the Chittagong region in the southeast. After its secession from Pakistan in 1971, Bangladesh had a troubled history of political instability, with periods of emergency rule. Effective democracy was restored in 1991. Bangladesh's major economic sectors are jute production, textiles, and agriculture. Its climate can wreak havoc – in 1991 a massive cyclone killed more than 140,000 people.

Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries in the world, despite the fact that three-quarters of the population is rural. As in India, there is considerable Muslim–Hindu tension; in 2001 thousands of Hindus and other religious minorities claimed persecution from the new nationalist government.

Although more than 50% of Bangladeshis, rural and urban, still live below the poverty line, there has been an improvement in living standards over the past decade.

The textile trade has been one factor in the growing emancipation of Bangladeshi women, by providing them with an independent income. Women are now included in official employment statistics and are the main customers of the most successful rural bank. They have led both the government and the opposition. However, Bangladesh was criticized by Amnesty International in 2000 for insufficiently protecting women's rights, and a UN report later that year revealed that almost 50% of Bangladeshi women are victims of domestic violence.

Strengths

80% of the world's jute fiber exports come from Bangladesh. Low wages ensure a competitive and expanding textile industry, which forms the backbone of the manufacturing sector, and provides over three-quarters of export earnings.

Weaknesses

The agricultural sector, employing the majority of Bangladeshis, is vulnerable to the violent and unpredictable climate.

Profile

Government ministers like to portray Bangladesh as an emerging NIC, but its economy is still overwhelmingly dependent on agriculture and large aid inflows. Agriculture, which provides jute and tobacco, is productive; Bangladesh's soils, fed by the Ganges, Jamuna, and Meghna rivers, are highly fertile. However, the effects of the weather can be devastating, frequently destroying a whole year's crop. Agricultural wages are among the lowest in the world.

The state sector, which owns large, inefficient, and massively loss-making companies, is in difficulty. The World Bank, the source of most aid, wishes to see loss-making concerns cut their workforces or close down. A privatization program was announced in 2002.

Textiles and garments are currently the healthiest sectors. Economic zones (export processing zones) with special concessions have attracted foreign investment, as well as helped to promote a small indigenous electronics industry. Bangladesh receives generous textile import quotas from the EU and NAFTA.

Bangladesh returned to multiparty democracy in 1991, following a period of military rule.

Profile

Between 1975 and 1990 the military was in power in Bangladesh. The overthrow of President Ershad in 1990 saw a return to multiparty politics; the army remains poised, however, to intervene in the event of a breakdown in internal order.

Bangladesh's first woman prime minister, Begum Khaleda Zia, head of the BNP, was elected in 1991. A change from a presidential to a prime-ministerial system of government followed.

The AL, which had steered Bangladesh to independence in 1971, mounted a sustained campaign against Khaleda Zia's regime, forcing a rerun of elections in 1996. It won the largest number of seats and its leader, Sheikh Hasina Wajed, went on to become the first prime minister to complete a full term. The revived BNP returned to power in the October 2001 poll, amid much electoral violence, and formed a coalition with the hard-line Islamic JI.

Main Political Issues

The state sector

Bangladesh is coming under mounting pressure from multilateral lending institutions, which account for the vast majority of the country's capital inflows, to cut costs in the state sector. Simultaneously, state-sector workers are demanding wage increases in line with inflation.

Autonomy for Chittagong Hill Tracts

Buddhist Mongol groups – the Chakma – continue to voice demands for greater autonomy, although the low-level guerrilla war they have waged since 1974 has been contained. Many Chakmas fear persecution by Bengali Muslim settlers, despite a peace treaty signed in 1997 which provides for local autonomy, amnesty, and the return of refugees from India.

Good relations with the West, the main source of essential aid, are a priority. Relations with Pakistan have slowly improved since Pakistan's agreement in 1991 to accept the 250,000 pro-Pakistan Bihari Muslims in Bangladeshi refugee camps since 1971. Relations with India are improving. The damaging effects of the construction of the Farakka Dam on the Ganges, which deprived Bangladesh of irrigation water, have been alleviated by a 30-year agreement signed in 1996 guaranteeing the right of both parties to share the Ganges water. Bilateral relations eased further with the 1997 Chittagong Hill Tracts treaty; India had been accused of fomenting unrest.

The military, which dominated politics between 1975 and 1990, still wields considerable influence, despite the restoration of civilian government. Although there is greater emphasis on poverty alleviation programs, spending on defense is disproportionately high. Plans to improve security by constructing a 4000-km (2500-mile) road along the border with India were announced in mid-2000.

Bangladesh is the world's major jute producer, accounting for 80% of world jute fiber exports and about 50% of world jute manufactures exports.

Bangladesh holds world-class gas reserves, estimated to last as much as 200 years at the present extraction rate. Natural gas from the Bay of Bengal, exploited by the state-owned Bangladesh Oil, Gas, and Minerals Corporation, came on stream in 1988.

Bangladesh's climate gives rise to devastating floods and cyclones, with consequent huge death tolls and substantial damage to crops. The country is too poor to finance environmental initiatives.

Most transportation in Bangladesh is by water, although government policy is now concentrating on developing road and rail links, including the reopening in mid-2000 of a passenger rail service into India. The Bangabandhu bridge across the Jamuna River, which bisects Bangladesh from north to south, was inaugurated in June 1998, after numerous delays. Bangladesh's two major ports, Mungla and Chittagong, are being upgraded to take advanced container ships.

More resources are needed to boost health care in rural areas. Although primary health care in these areas improved in the 1990s, Bangladesh's health problems remain severe and are exacerbated by a shortage of medical staff and facilities. Priority for birth control programs has helped reduce the population growth rate by more than 20% over the last 15 years. Half the population is exposed to high levels of arsenic in drinking water.

Education issues in Bangladeshi society have been poorly addressed, although successive governments have promised to improve literacy levels by increasing spending. A dramatic reduction in the 1990s in the number of child workers meant an accompanying rise in school attendance. Exam cheating is a serious problem. The seven universities are frequently beset by political violence.

Rising levels of political and religious violence have led to the enforcement of antiterrorism legislation, containing provisions for summary justice and heavy penalties, including death. There has been a recent sharp rise in crimes against women, including murder, rape, abduction, and acid attacks. Deaths in Bangladeshi prisons are common, and, in addition, the human rights record of the security forces, especially the paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles, has been attacked by Amnesty International.

Average incomes in Bangladesh remain very low, but wealth disparities are not quite as marked as in India or Pakistan. State officials tend to be among the better-off sectors of society.

The Mughal architecture in Dhaka and the Pala dynasty (7th–10th centuries) city of Sonargaon, just to the southeast, are major attractions, but tourists may be deterred by social and political unrest. Most visitors are Indian businessmen or Bangladeshis living overseas who return to visit relatives.

Bengal was the first part of the Indian subcontinent to come under British rule when the East India Company was made the Diwani (tax collector) by the Mughal emperor in 1765.

• 1905 Muslims persuade British rulers to partition state of Bengal, to create a Muslim-dominated East Bengal.
• 1906 Muslim League established in Dhaka.
• 1912 Partition of 1905 reversed.
• 1947 British withdrawal from India. Partition plans establish a largely Muslim state of East (present-day Bangladesh) and West Pakistan, separated by 1600 km (1000 miles) of Indian, and largely Hindu, territory.
• 1949 AL founded to campaign for autonomy from West Pakistan.
• 1968 Gen. Yahya Khan heads government in Islamabad.
• 1970 Elections give AL, under Sheikh Mujib ur-Rahman, clear majority. Rioting and guerrilla warfare following Yahya Khan's refusal to convene assembly. The year ends with the worst recorded storms in Bangladesh's history – between 200,000 and 500,000 dead.
• 1971 Civil war, as Sheikh Mujib and AL declare unilateral independence. Ten million Bangladeshis flee to India. Pakistani troops defeated in 12 days by Mukhti Bahini – the Bengal Liberation Army.
• 1972 Sheikh Mujib elected prime minister. Nationalization of key industries, including jute and textile. Bangladesh achieves international recognition and joins Commonwealth. Pakistan withdraws in protest.
• 1974 Severe floods damage rice crop.
• 1975 Sheikh Mujib assassinated. Military coups end with Gen. Ziaur Rahman taking power. Institution of single-party state.
• 1976 Banning of trade union federations.
• 1977 Gen. Zia assumes presidency. Islam adopted as first principle of the constitution.
• 1981 Gen. Zia assassinated.
• 1982 Gen. Ershad takes over.
• 1983 Democratic elections restored by Ershad. Ershad assumes presidency.
• 1986 Elections. AL and BNP fail to unseat Ershad.
• 1987 Ershad announces state of emergency.
• 1988 Islam becomes constitutional state religion.
• 1990 Ershad resigns following demonstrations.
• 1991 Elections won by BNP. Khaleda Zia becomes prime minister. Ershad imprisoned. Role of the president reduced to ceremonial functions. Floods kill 140,000 people.
• 1994 Author Taslima Nasreen, who is accused of blasphemy, escapes to Sweden.
• 1996 Election returns BNP to power. Results are rejected by opposition parties, which force fresh elections. Sheikh Hasina Wajed of AL takes power.
• 2001 Supreme Court declares issuing of religious decrees (fatwas) to be a criminal offense. BNP returned to power following violence-marred elections.