Staff Correspondent

"Food costs are on the rise and Bangladesh and many other countries are in trouble. The government is having a hard time coping with the burden of ever-increasing subsidies on food as the prices are climbing in the international market," the adviser told a seminar in the city.

"The World Bank and IMF are expressing concern over the crisis, but they are not doing anything to ease the problem," he said at the seminar on "Social protection as a strategy in transformative social policy", organised by Unicef at Sonargaon Hotel. Policymakers from eight countries in South Asia joined the three-day gathering from Tuesday to examine the role social protection can play in reducing poverty and inequalities in the region.

Unicef regional director for South Asia Daniel Toole and SAARC director for social affairs Hassan Shifau were among those present. Although poverty rates in South Asia have decreased remarkably over the region as a whole, over 400 million people remain under the poverty line – representing 40 percent of the world's poor — according to Unicef.

"Women and children, notably those excluded from resources, incomes and social services, are the most affected by the disconnect between high economic growth rates and low progress on human development indicators," said Daniel Toole.

The finance adviser expressed the view, however, that donor agencies talked at length about their concern over the global food crisis but did not provide poor countries like Bangladesh with any help to overcome the crisis.

He added that the "so-called development agencies" did not come up with any mentionable assistance to countries facing natural disasters caused by climate change. "I haven't seen any such activity so far," Mirza Aziz said. He said he hoped these agencies would lend a hand to developing nations soon to overcome food crisis.