BANGLADESH

Bangladesh's family planning programme has succeeded with a bang, claim officials. "We have been able to make quite a headway in birth control despite the fact that all the variables necessary for the success of a family planning programme are absent in Bangladesh," asserts Mizanur Rehman, director general, Family Planning Association of Bangladesh.

The country's population now is estimated to have downslid by 2 per cent due to widespread contraceptive use: till 1990, the usage increased by more than 40 per cent over 1975.