Special focus

The Bangladesh sorghum

In 7 9 78, an experiment was underiaken in Bangladesh to test the possibiliry of

targeting part of the country’s public food system toward the poorer and more

malnourjshed population groups through the introduction of a lower-status,

but nutritional& valuable food. Sorghum, as a representative inexpensive

coarse grain, was selected and introduced into a set of ration shops in both

urban and rural areas. Given the low, or negative, income elasticity of demand

for sorghum among the middle c/ass, offtakes in the urban test were low.

However, in the ruraf areas, offtakes were substantial, particularly among the

dower-in&ome groups, reaching a/most 70% in one of the two districts studied.

Although this would suggest that the programme has considerable potential in

affecting malnutrition and, to a lesser extent, the distribution of income, other

information collected on the rural ration system as a whole indicates that,

unless the larger system is reoriented, this potential has little chance of being

realized.

In recent years, the issue of consumer food subsidies has received increased attention by the development community. These ration, or fair-price systems, which operate in all the countries of South Asia and in several African countries, have been heavily criticized in the past for their expense, having high administrative opportunity costs, and the potential to affect adversely domestic food production. Even today, the International Monetary Fund and other international banks and development organizations apply considerable pressure on countries with such subsidies to reduce or terminate them.

At the same time, recent analysis of these subsidized consumption systems in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Egypt and the South Indian state of Kerala indicate that they have the potential for major income distributional and nutritional benefits.’ The World Bank, in fact, in a forthcoming policy paper on ‘Nutrition and basic needs’, argues that few other nutrition interventions offer the possibility of substantially alleviating widespread malnutrition among the poor in these countries in a reasonable length of time.

FOOD POLICY February 1980

The Bangladesh ration system

While subsidized food consumptions systems have been found to be of considerable value in improving the well-being of low-income groups in several countries,* the mere existence of a ration system in no way guarantees that this will happen.

This is well reflected in Bangladesh where the ration system has traditionally been oriented towards the politically pivotal urban middle class, rather than towards the basic needs of the poor. The Bangladesh ration system which provides rice and wheat at roughly two-thirds of their own open market prices, reaches less than 25% of the country’s population and less than 15% of the rural population. Fully 70% of food distributed through the ration system goes to urban consumers, yet only 27% of the poorest and most malnourished urban families have access to the system.

The sorghum experiment

In 1978. a group of concerned individuals from the Bangladesh government’s Ministry of Food, the

Institute of Nutrition and Food Science at the University of Dacca, and the United States Agency for International Development began meeting to consider whether it might be possible to bias the ofl’take of the country’s ration system toward lower-income groups through changes in the commodities offered. Analysis in Pakistan> had found that the USf2 of flour-milled whole wheat (nutritionally valuable, but low in status) in that country’s ration system had the effect of targeting offtakes toward the lowest-income groups, without a politically and administra- tively problematic means test.

The foods. we found, which exhibited the same characteristics in Bangladesh - i.e. low price; a tow or negative income elasticity of demand among the middle and upper income groups but a relatively high elasticity among the poor; and relatively high nutritional value - were the coarse grains (the millets and sorghum). These crops were found to be attractive on the production side as well, since they are produced easily and inexpensively on land not suited for rice and wheat production. Irrigation is not necessary since the coarse grains are drought-resistant. At present, almost half a million acres are under coarse grain production in Bangladesh.4

To examine the viability of this concept, a study was initiated in the urban ration system in Dacca and in the rural ration systems in Faridpur and Jessore Districts in the southwestern part of the country.5 The coarse grain selected for the test, sorghum, was introduced into 20 ration shops spread throughout Dacca city, and 103 rural ration shops in Faridpur and Jessore, principally from August to October 1978. A price of Tk 1.25’ ($0.08) per kilogram, about half the price of rice, and five-eighths the price of wheat, was set by the government. Sorghum was offered to consumers either in addition to their regular rice and/or wheat rations, or as an equal volume substitute for all or part of the regular ration.

As expected. given the predominance of middle-class consumers in the urban ration system, sorghum sates in Dacca were extremely low, rarely exceeding 5% of the consumers in any given shop. However, in the rural ration system the results were quite different.

61

Specialfocus

Table 1. Number of households using ration system in selected areas of Jessore District, and percentage purchasing sorghum, by economic status.

Month

August

September

October

Number of households using ration Percentages of households purchasing system, by economic status sorghum, by economic status

A 0 C D A B C D

2641 1801 944 443 47.9 49.6 18.8 7.5

3248 2437 616 305 65.1 52.6 13.8 1.3

3049 2348 570 327 68.9 54.6 16.0 1.5

Rural consumers can be categorized by the type of ration card they have allocated. These categories, from the lowest ‘A’, to the highest, ‘D’, in turn, are based on the land tax paid. ‘A’ card holders, generally landless, pay no land tax. Other card holders pay Tk3-I5 ($0.20 to I .OO) per acre per year, itself a commentary on the government’s inability, or unwillingness, to generate revenue from landholders. The group unrepresented in this breakdown is the so-called ‘floating’ population, the migrants, with no specific address and, therefore, in Bangladesh. ineligible to use the ration system at all. This floating population, inevitably the poorest of all, is estimated at 10% of rural households.

study indicate that the potential of this type of targeting may be severely limited by the operation of the rural ration system itself.

The most serious problems are reflected in Table 2, which indicates that only a quarter to a third of those eligible to use the ration system actually draw their ration in a given month. In addition, although the system is

theoretically designed to give priority to the poorest groups, the data indicate that utilization for each of the card holding groups is about the same.

comparison, the urban ration system was found to provide between 55 and 62% of the total cereals purchased by its largely middle-class consumers in Dacca.

Table I presents the results for Jessore District, from which the most complete data were collected. The table indicates not only the substantial percentage of ration shop users who purchased sorghum during these 3 months, but also the strong bias toward the lowest-income consumers, the ‘A’ and ‘B’ card holders. Finally, it indicates that, with greater exposure. the use of sorghum by these low-income groups increases, to a level of almost 70% among the ‘A’ card holders, while sorghum consumption among the ‘D’ card holders falls to 1.5% of those using the system.

Of those persons who do use the ration system, the size of the foodgrain ration given is pitifully small. Although rural ration system recipients are supposed to receive half of the 12 kg per capita monthly urban ration allotment, the actual ration was found to average less than 10% of the urban ration. Even with this small ration, roughly 25% of the ‘A’ card holders using the shops purchased less, than the full ration. Finally, 10% of the shops studied in any given month had no food distribution operation at all.

Finally, Table 4 indicates the real income increment provided by the rural ration with and without sorghum (columns 3 and 4) and the percentage increase in real income these represent (columns 5 and 6). Once again, the contribution is negligible. Even with sorghum. the rural ration system results in a real income increase of only 2.5% for the lowest income card holders. The comparable figures in Pakistan and Sri Lanka were found to be 9 and 15% respectively.

Conclusions

The meagreness and uncertainty of the rural ration is well reflected in Tables 3 and 4. Table 3 indicates the

The table indicates clearly that the introduction of sorghum in the rural ration system has the potential to bias offtakes sharply towards the poor and increase the benefits this group derives from the system. It seems to be a natural means of addressing the astonishingly high rates of malnutrition in the country,’ and, more marginally, the highly skewed distribution of income.

A small part of the supply and coverage problems identified above are technical in nature, and could be improved by better scheduling and communication methods. For the most part, however, the problem is not technical but political. The government’s clear priority is an uninterrupted food supply to its urban middle-class constituency. The rural ration system, where and when it operates, is viewed largely as a means of maintaining the support of local officials (union council members), who use this food distribution to strengthen the semi-feudal patron-client bonds which characterize rural Bangladesh. Ultimately, the operation of the public ration system is simply a lamentable manifestation of the fact that the government is not yet seriously committed to meeting the basic needs of its poor.

Unfortunately, other data collected on the rural ration system as part of the

average monthly household cereal consumption by ration card category and the percentage of this food available from the consumers’ own land, from the open market, and from the ration system. The data convey the extent to which the poor are dependent on the open market and the minimal contribution made to their diets by the ration system. Although the addition of sorghum has the potential of almost doubling the percentage of foodgrains which the ‘A’ card holders procure from the ration system, that percentage remains extremely low (roughly 7% of total cereals consumed). By

The sorghum programme is being extended to five more districts with the temporary assistance of the USA.” This is one of a very small number of

62 FOOD POLICY February 1980

programmes currently being undertaken in Bangladesh, which appear to benefit the poor disproportionately, and which have the potential of addressing malnutrition among this group. However, unless the overall ration system is reoriented, this potential has little chance of being realized.

Rezaul Karim, Manjur Majid, and F.

James Levinson

’ Paul Isenman. The Relationship of Basic Needs to Growth, Income Distribution and Employment.. The Case of Sri Lanka, The World Bank, Washington, DC, 1978;

B.L. Rogers and F.J. Levinson, Subsidized Food Consumption Systems in Low Income Countries: The Pakistan Experience, MIT International Nutrition Planning Program, Discussion Paper No 6, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, April 1976; Lance Taylor, Food Subsidies and Income Distribution in Egypt, mimeo, MIT International Nutrition Planning Program, draft report, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, September 1976: Centre for Development Studies, Trivandrum, Kerala, India, PO verty, Unemployment and Development Policy: A Case Study of Selected Issues with Reference to Kerala, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, New York, 1975. ’ F.J. Levinson. ‘Incorporating nutrition in agricultural, food and health policies in South Asia’, paper presented at the Regional Seminar on an Integrated

Table 2. Number of households eligible to use ration system in selected areas of Jessore District, and percentage which actually use system, by economic status.

Percentage using ration system

Economic status No of eligible households August September October

A 10 123 26.1 32.1 30.1 B 8 290 21.7 29.4 28.3 C 2 446 38.6 25.2 23.3 D 1 263 35.1 24.2 25.9

.

Table 3. Average household cereal consumption in selected areas of Jessore District, and source breakdown, by economic status grouping.

Economic Average household % from % from Percent from ration systema status cereal consumption owned land open market Rice Et wheat Sorghum

per month Ikgs)

A 94.7 6.5 86.4 3.9 3.3 0 112.2 26.3 66.7 4.0 3.1 C 174.5 92.5 2.1 4.1 1.3 D 186.8 80.7 14.3 2.5 2.5

a Computed for those persons purchasing sorghum

Special focus

Approach to Population, Food and Nutrition Policies and Programs for National Development sponsored by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok, July 1979. 3 Rogers and Levinson, op cit. Ref 1. .a R. Karim and F.J. Levinson, ‘Addressing socio-economic constraints to improved nutrition in Bangladesh: a missing dimension of food and agricultural policy’, paper presented at the Third Bangladesh Nutrition Seminar, Dacca, 22-24 March 1979. ‘In Bangladesh, rationing in the six largest cities falls under the so-called ‘statutory’ ration system, while elsewhere it is referred to as the ‘modified’ ration system. To avoid confusion here, we use only the terms ‘urban’ and ‘rural’. ‘Tk is an abbreviation for the Bangladeshi unit of currency, taka (One taka is equivalent to $0.065). ’ Nutrition Survey of Rural Bangladesh, 797576, Institute of Nutrition and Food Science, University of Dacca, 1977. This survey found that fully 30% of rural households were consuming less than 80% of their calorie needs. It also found that 75% of rural children under the age of three were suffering from 2nd and 3rd degree malnutrition, the more serious categories, based on weight for age standards. The comparable figure for most of Latin America would be less than 20%. ‘Rogers and Levinson: Isenman. op cit. Ref 1. ‘This was necessitated by the fact that sorghum, in Bangladesh. is produced primarily by subsistence farmers and not viewed as a cash crop, thus making a large-scale government procurement programme difficult at present. Interestingly, the US Department of Agriculture, which has no major sorghum surplus this year, was strongly resistant to the idea of even limited sorghum shipments. The Bangladesh government was, of course, willing to accept the sorghum on concessional terms, but made explicit that the sorghum imports would not take precedence over the edible oil and cotton it was seeking from the USA, again for its urban constituency.

Table 4. Actual and percentage increments to real income resulting from rural ration system with and without sorghum, in selected areas of Jessore District, by economic status,

Economic Average per Increment to real Increment to real Percentage increase Percentage increase status capita income provided income provided in real income in real income

income by normal ration by the normal attributable to attributable to (Tk per month) a subsidy tTkIa ration plus normal ration the normal ration

sorghum ITk)a,b plus sorghum b

A 37 0.58 0.92 1.57 2.49 B 62 0.77 1.12 1.24 1.81 C 87 0.56 0.71 0.65 0.82 D 112 0.88 1.17 0.79 1.04

a One taka is equivalent to $f .65. b Computed only for those persons purchasing sorghum

FOOD POLICY February 1980