Bangladesh, whose progressive economic and social policies, are giving it global recognition, ranks first in the world in supporting lactating women and achieving the status of a “green” nation, along with Sri Lanka, according to the World Breastfeeding Trends Initiative (WBTi). Only the two South Asian countries out of 98 received the “green status”.

Bangladesh got rank number one by scoring 91.5 out of 100. India stands at 79, Nepal at 39 and Maldives at 19.

The results are based on a country’s performance on 10 indicators of policies and programs the WBTi uses to color-code and rank nations. In ascending order of performance, the color codes are red, yellow, blue and green.

“Bangladesh that scored 91.5/100 earned a green colour code, which implies the best level of performance. This has been the result of persistent efforts since 2005 to pursue improvements.

"Bangladesh demonstrated high-level commitment, led by its prime minister, towards health and nutrition of mothers and babies,” Dr Arun Gupta, WBTi's global coordinator, was quoted as saying in Dhaka Tribune.

Launched in 2004, WBTi assists countries to assess the status of and benchmark the progress in implementation of the Global Strategy for Infant and Young Child Feeding (IYCF) in a standard way.

It is based on the WHO's tool for a national assessment of policy and programs on infant and young child feeding.

Inadequate breastfeeding costs the global economy almost USD 1 billion each day due to loss in productivity and healthcare costs. In addition, it saves 700,000 lives annually.

(SAM)