The National Food Policy (NFP) 2006 of Bangladesh provides strategic guidance for achieving
food and nutrition security in the country. The goal of the NFP is to ensure dependable food
security for all people of the country at all times. Three indicators have been used to monitor
progress towards the goal: prevalence of undernourishment, child underweight and child
stunting. These indicators are complemented by another four food security indicators included in
the Results Framework of the Sixth Five Year Plan (SFYP). These are growth of agricultural
GDP, government spending on social protection, change in poverty rate and change in rice wage.
Bangladesh reached the MDG target of undernourishment in early 2000s. Underweight and
stunting also declined between 2007-08 and 2012-13, albeit slowly. Agricultural GDP growth
weakened for the second consecutive year, reaching 2.17% in 2012-13; and spending on social
protection as per cent of GDP continued to decline, reaching 2.23% in 2012-13 – both falling
short of targets. Poverty rate declined satisfactorily, reaching 31.5% in 2010. This trend of
decline along with the per capita GDP growth rate suggests that the poverty head count in 2012-
13 may have already reached around 27%, against the MDG target of 29% by 2015. The rice
wage also got increased by 5.8% which is 17 % above the target for 2012-13 (FPMU 2014).
It is this backdrop in respect of progress and status of broader aspect of food security against
which the Government of Bangladesh is set to formulate the new 7th Five Year Plan. The purpose
of this paper is to review progress of the detailed dimensions of food security under the 6th Five
Year Plan and set the food security goal, objectives, targets and implementation strategy under
the new 7th Five Year Plan (FYP). Attempt is also made to make an outline of the new National
Food Policy, to be aligned with the 7th FYP, in line with the terms of reference for preparing the
paper.