The political economy of the food subsidy system in Bangladesh

This article examines the operation of the food subsidy, system in Banglade sh from 1980 to 1995 using a political economy, perspective. Two political economy concepts - rent-seeking lobbies and rent-seeking bureaucrats/agents - are found to be useful in providing a partial explanation of why this sy stem has failed to benefit the rural poor: However; each of these explanati ons is incomplete because if fails to consider the large impact that extern al actors - USAID and the World Bank - have had on the Bangladesh food subs idy system. One way to improve the ability of this system to reach the poor would be to increase the amount of self-targeting in food subsidies by bui lding on the Food-for-Work programme.