Dhaka, Sept. 26 -- Bangladesh lags far behind other lower-middle-income countries (LMICs) in allocations for local governments despite rapid urbanisation that has brought nearly 45 per cent of its population into cities.

LMICs spend about 20 per cent of their national budgets -- or around 6.0 per cent of GDP -- on local governments, while Bangladesh allocates only 7.0 per cent of its national budget, equivalent to just 1.0 per cent of GDP, reveals a study of the Policy Research Institute of Bangladesh (PRI).

Dr Ahmad Ahsan, Director of PRI, presented the paper at a seminar titled "Can Bangladesh Develop Without Decentralising? - Some Lessons from East Asia and Thoughts on the Local Government Reform and Other Commissions' Reports", arra...