# *Bangladesh Priorities* (2016 / 2017) Back to [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Books Overview|Books Overview]] · [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/BjornLomborg-x-profile|@BjornLomborg]] · Topic: [[Topics/Climate Change Science and Policy Debate/Climate Change Science and Policy Debate|Climate Change Science and Policy Debate]] > **Reference outline for a reader who has read the book.** This queue item covers two related publications of the same Copenhagen Consensus Center / BRAC project: a short popular book (English and Bangla) and a later two-volume set of the research papers. I did not open either typeset book this run ⚠️. Facts below come from the CCC project, book and news pages, the official **Eminent Panel Findings** PDF (14 pages, A4, created **27 May 2016**, dated Dhaka **12 May 2016**), a two-page **Smarter Solutions for Bangladesh** brochure PDF (created **9 September 2016**), Adorn Publication's catalogue pages, lomborg.com/publications, Lomborg's **11 June 2016** *Daily Star* op-ed, his **15 June 2016** *Project Syndicate* column (I opened only the lead; the rest was truncated ⚠️), and CCC pages on impact, youth forums and rural forums. I have not checked the typeset introductions, chapter texts or panel commentaries against those PDFs ⚠️. ## Publication facts The project produced more than one book. Treat them as a pair, not as one edition. ### Short popular book (English and Bangla) - **Title:** *Bangladesh Priorities: Ranking the smartest solutions by their benefits and costs.* - **Publisher:** **Adorn Publication**, 22 Segun Bagicha, Dhaka (the house's own catalogue). A CCC book-launch post (dated **5 December 2016**) says "Adorn Books." lomborg.com/publications and the CCC book page both print **"Adhorn Books"** — almost certainly a typo for Adorn ⚠️. - **Year:** The CCC book page says **Published: 2016**. Adorn's English catalogue listing says **Year 2017**, hardcover, 1st edition, **128** pages. The launch post is dated 5 December 2016 and places the event at Nalinikanta Bhattasali Gallery, Bangladesh National Museum, "during the New Year book fair event." CCC's media list records *Observer BD* coverage of the launch on **11 January 2017**. I did not open a title-page verso, so I report both the 2016 CCC date and the 2017 catalogue / January coverage ⚠️. - **ISBN (English, from Adorn's catalogue):** **978-984-20-0515-2** (printed there as "978 984 20 0515-2"), hardcover, 128 pp., priced ৳275. - **ISBN (Bangla listing, from Adorn's catalogue):** **978-984-20-0511-4**, hardcover, **136** pages. The Bangla page's "Language" field still says "English," which looks like a catalogue error ⚠️. I did not open the Bangla volume. - **What it is:** The launch post says it is "based on the article series published in Daily Star and Prothom Alo" and "provides an excellent overview and introduction to all research findings, the outcomes from the prioritization exercises, the rural and youth forums, and presents the Eminent Panel’s recommendations with short commentaries." A 23 September 2016 CCC update had planned "two much shorter, popular books, in English and Bangla" to be launched "at the same time" as the academic volumes; the actual dates were staggered ⚠️. ### Two-volume research set - **Title, with wording that shifts by page ⚠️:** CCC book page heading *Bangladesh Priorities: Helping Make Vision 2021 A Reality*; the same page's blurb says "Priorities for Bangladesh: Helping Vision 2021 a Reality"; a 4 September 2017 CCC news post (the URL slug mistypes the year as 2012) uses the "Helping Make Vision 2021 A Reality" form; a New Delhi bookseller listing (Readers End) uses "Helping Vision 2021 a Reality (In 2 Volumes)." - **Publisher / year:** CCC book page and lomborg.com: **AHDPH, 2017**. That abbreviation is **AH Development Publishing House** (also styled A.H. / A H Development Publishing House in library and bookseller records). Readers End: 1st edition, **1,241** pages, black-and-white illustrations and maps, 22 cm — matching the "1,241 pages of benefit-cost research in two volumes" Lomborg presented to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at a Bangladesh UNGA event (CCC news post, 4 October 2017). - **ISBN:** I did not find a reliably sourced ISBN for the AHDPH set ⚠️. A Jahangirnagar University Library cover URL contains `0991173368`; I did not treat that as a confirmed ISBN. Another Jahangirnagar record lists a 2017 University Press Limited book of similar title under Mahfuzur Rahman, which may be a different work ⚠️. A third Jahangirnagar record catalogues *Helping make Vision 2021 a reality* as Dhaka: Copenhagen Consensus Center & BRAC Research and Evaluation Division, **c2016**, with Lomborg and Mushtaque Chowdhury; I did not see that printing ⚠️. - **Editors / names on the books:** Lomborg is the editor in the CCC/lomborg.com listings. Library and bookseller records also co-list **Mushtaque Chowdhury** and **Mahfuzar / Mahfuzur Rahman**. I did not open a title page ⚠️. - **Contents (CCC book page, not a typeset TOC ⚠️):** Volume 1 is described as covering e-procurement, Dhaka livability and transport, migration, the ready-made garment industry, village courts, the Padma Bridge, golden rice, early child marriage, climate change, energy, maternal and neonatal mortality, and non-communicable diseases. Volume 2 is described as covering poverty, pollution, health and nutrition, trade and markets, intra-regional transport, digitization and land records. The 4 September 2017 news post says the two volumes also include "the conclusions of the eminent panel." ### Project setting - **Project title:** *Bangladesh Priorities: Smarter Solutions for Bangladesh.* Led by the Copenhagen Consensus Center with **BRAC's Research and Evaluation Division (BRAC RED)**. Project manager named on CCC pages: **Brad Wong**; outreach manager: **Hasanuzzaman Zaman**. - **Funders:** Lomborg's September/October 2017 *Foreign Affairs* essay (quoted on the CCC project page): **C&A Foundation** (affiliate of C&A), with help from the **Swedish International Development Cooperaton Agency** (Sida; "Cooperaton" is the typo as printed) and the **Danish embassy in Dhaka**. The brochure footer: "Internation co-ordination: SIDA" and "Youth Forums: Denmark." A 23 September 2016 update says the youth forums had **DANIDA** support. The earlier one-page process sheet (file dated **11 June 2015**, i.e. before the research was finished) is a planning document and still says "30–50 solutions" ⚠️. - **Place in his work:** The first national Copenhagen Consensus after the regional [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Latin American Development Priorities|*Latin American Development Priorities*]] (Consulta de San José). It is the immediate predecessor of *Haiti Prioritizes* (2018) in this queue, and the template for later country books (Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Ghana, and others listed on the CCC books page). It sits next to the global Post-2015 volumes [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Prioritizing the World|*Prioritizing the World*]] and [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/The Nobel Laureates' Guide to the Smartest Targets for the World 2016-2030|*The Nobel Laureates' Guide…*]]. ## Thesis Bangladesh had halved poverty and was growing at about 6 percent a year (CCC project page), and was working toward middle-income status under the **7th Five Year Plan (2015–16 to 2019–20)** and **Vision 2021**. The question is not whether there are good ideas — the Planning Commission's 26 background studies, NGOs and think tanks already supply those — but where *additional* resources should go first. The popular book's opening question, reused from Lomborg's 11 June 2016 *Daily Star* column, is: if you had **Tk 250 billion** to spend on Bangladesh's future — "roughly just ten percent of what the national government and international aid agencies combined spend in the country each year" — where should it go? *Foreign Affairs* gives the underlying budget figures Lomborg used: a government budget of **$30 billion** a year and **$3 billion** in outside development aid. I did not independently check those totals ⚠️. The recurring campaign claim, in Lomborg's words on the CCC project page, is: "Over five years, spending just 1% of the Bangladeshi budget on smarter policies could make Bangladesh **Tk 3.7 trillion** better off. And development agencies could achieve **US$4 billion** more, if just 1% of their spending was better allocated." I did not re-derive those figures ⚠️. ## How the project was run From the 12 May 2016 outcome PDF unless noted: 1. Review of the **26** background studies for the 7th Five Year Plan (General Economics Division, Planning Commission), plus interviews with Bangladeshi experts. 2. In **2015**, **20 Ideas Roundtables**, co-hosted with BRAC: **450** participants from government, NGOs and universities; **more than 1,000** possible interventions. (The later brochure says "**more than 800** people … identified 76 promising solutions"; the 2017 CCC book page says "**over 400** experts … analyzed more than 1000 proposals." These are different tallies of overlapping stages ⚠️.) 3. The long list was cut to **76** proposals by online surveys of the sector experts and a "Reference Group" of leading Bangladeshis and development partners. 4. Research papers on those 76, by "**more than 30** economists" in Bangladesh and abroad (the conference page adds that **more than 60%** of the researchers were Bangladeshi), with standardized assumptions, peer review and Review Roundtables. The May 2016 PDF says this put "**more than 1,100+** pages" of research in public; the 2017 volumes are **1,241** pages ⚠️. 5. An **Eminent Panel** met in Dhaka **9–11 May 2016** (conference page; Lomborg's *Daily Star* column: "From May 9"; the outcome document is dated **12 May 2016**, when "the panel handed over the full list"). The CCC project homepage's process summary wrongly calls this "our **2015** Dhaka conference" ⚠️. 6. Parallel outreach: newspaper series in English and Bangla (*Daily Star*, *Prothom Alo*, and, per the brochure, also *Financial Express*, *Bangladesh Pratidin* and *Samakal*), radio and TV, government seminars, **youth forums** and **rural forums**. The panel's charge, in the outcome PDF: "Where should additional resources be spent first?" Each member gave a personal ranking; the published order is the **median** of those rankings, jointly endorsed. The panel "was guided predominantly by consideration of social, economic and environmental costs and benefits," but also "gave weight both to the institutional preconditions for success and to the demands of ethical or humanitarian importance." That is why the official list is not a sort of the brochure's benefit-cost ratios. ## The Eminent Panel Four members, from the outcome PDF: 1. **Finn E. Kydland** — University of California, Santa Barbara; 2004 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. 2. **Selima Ahmad** — President and Founder, Bangladesh Women Chamber of Commerce and Industry. 3. **Dr. KAS Murshid** — Director General, Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies. 4. **Dr. Mushtaque Chowdhury** — Vice Chair, BRAC. ## Official ranking (12 May 2016 outcome PDF) The panel ranked **72** of the 76 proposals and left **four** unranked (72 + 4 = 76). A later CCC UNGA post that says "72 researched policy suggestions" is counting only the ranked items ⚠️. Lomborg's *Daily Star* column says the project studied "**75** concrete solutions," one short of the official 76 ⚠️. Ranks below are from the PDF's table, which is the document the panel "jointly endorses." The same PDF's later topic-by-topic narrative often cites a different number — commonly one rank worse, and in a few cases a different number altogether (Improve Teacher Accountability is **#51** in the table and "ranked at **31**" in the notes; Expand Broadband is **#34** vs "ranking **36**"; Restoration of Buriganga is **#46** vs "ranking of **44**"). I follow the table and flag the notes ⚠️. The table also files **Newborn Homecare By Health Workers** under the topic "Education"; the notes correctly discuss it under Health System. That topic label is almost certainly a typo ⚠️. Benefit-cost ratios (BCR) in the last column are *not* from the ranking PDF. They are the "benefits for every taka or dollar spent" printed on the 9 September 2016 brochure (file later modified 12–13 December 2017). I did not re-open the underlying papers ⚠️. | # | Intervention | Topic (table) | Brochure BCR | |---|---|---|---| | 1 | TB Treatment | Health System & Access | 21 | | 2 | E-Procurement Across Government | Digital Bangladesh | 663 | | 3 | Nutrition & Micronutrients, ½–5 Year Olds | Food Security, Nutrition & Agriculture | 19 | | 4 | Land Records Digitization | Land Administration | 619 | | 5 | Bus Priority For Dhaka | Infrastructure (Transport) | 6 | | 6 | Increase Secondary Education For Girls | Gender Equality | 5 | | 7 | Iron And Folic Acid In Pregnancy | Food Security, Nutrition & Agriculture | 27 | | 8 | Psycho-Social Stimulation For Stunting | Education | 18 | | 9 | Immunize Children In Urban Slums | Health System & Access | 15 | | 10 | Hypertension Medication | Non-communicable Diseases | 18 (outcome notes: **38:1** at 60% coverage ⚠️) | | 11 | Union Digital Center Migration Services | Migration | 22 | | 12 | Retrofit Kilns, Outdoor Air Pollution | Environment and Biodiversity | 8 | | 13 | More Services At Union Digital Centers | Digital Bangladesh | 8 | | 14 | Treat Arsenic For 20% Worst Affected | Water and Sanitation | 17 | | 15 | Newborn Homecare By Health Workers | Education (likely Health typo ⚠️) | 27 | | 16 | Reform VAT And Automate Collection | Fiscal Management & Revenue Mobilization | 6 | | 17 | Access To Contraception | Gender Equality | 3 | | 18 | Golden Rice R&D | Food Security, Nutrition & Agriculture | "Up to 329" | | 19 | Expand Village Courts | Governance & Institutions | 18 (notes: 15.78–18.06) | | 20 | RMG Factory Compliance | Industrial Policy and Trade | 14 | | 21 | Balanced Protein Energy In Pregnancy | Food Security, Nutrition & Agriculture | 17 | | 22 | Solid Waste Management In Dhaka | Environment and Biodiversity | 6 | | 23 | Multi-Drug Resistant TB Treatment | Health System & Access | 3 | | 24 | Immunize Children In Remote Areas | Health System & Access | 8 | | 25 | Facility Births With Skilled Attendant | Health System & Access | 8 | | 26 | Tobacco Tax | Non-communicable Diseases | 8 | | 27 | Shared Diesel To Replace Kerosene | Infrastructure (Energy) | 25 | | 28 | Import Coal For More Power | Infrastructure (Energy) | 23 | | 29 | Calcium In Pregnancy | Food Security, Nutrition & Agriculture | 12 | | 30 | RMG Palli Special Zone | Industrial Policy and Trade | 8 | | 31 | Gasifier Stove | Environment and Biodiversity | 4 | | 32 | Ultra-Poor Graduation Programs | Poverty, Entrepreneurship and Growth | 1.9 | | 33 | Skills Training For Migrants | Migration | 3 | | 34 | Expand Broadband | Digital Bangladesh | 5 | | 35 | Diabetes Treatment | Non-communicable Diseases | 3 | | 36 | Trade Liberalization | Industrial Policy and Trade | 10 | | 37 | Household Solar To Replace Kerosene | Infrastructure (Energy) | 1.8 | | 38 | Group And Teach According To Ability | Education | 12 | | 39 | Sanitation | Water and Sanitation | 2 | | 40 | Biomass Cookstoves, Indoor Air Pollution | Environment and Biodiversity | 5 | | 41 | Hand-Washing Promotion | Water and Sanitation | 1.2 | | 42 | Stormwater Drainage In Dhaka | Urbanization | 2 | | 43 | Transport Infrastructure For Dhaka | Infrastructure (Transport) | 3 | | 44 | Treat Arsenic For All Affected | Water and Sanitation | 7 | | 45 | Boost Agricultural Productivity | Climate change | 4 | | 46 | Restoration Of Buriganga River System | Environment and Biodiversity | 1.5 | | 47 | Early Warning Systems And Shelters | Climate change | 1.8 | | 48 | On-The-Job Management Training | Education | 5 | | 49 | Smokeless Tobacco Cessation | Non-communicable Diseases | 9 | | 50 | Resettlement To Manufacturing Cities | Climate change | 3 | | 51 | Improve Teacher Accountability | Education | 1+ | | 52 | Polders, Flood Level Less Than 3m | Climate change | 1.8 | | 53 | Padma Bridge | Infrastructure (Transport) | 1.9 | | 54 | Trade Facilitation | Industrial Policy and Trade | 2 | | 55 | Improve School Management | Education | 1+ | | 56 | New Hybrid Kilns, Outdoor Air Pollution | Environment and Biodiversity | 3 | | 57 | Seasonal Migration Stipends | Migration | 4 | | 58 | Treat And Immunize Cervical Cancer | Non-communicable Diseases | 0.4 | | 59 | Mangrove Protection In Sundarbans | Climate change | 2.8 | | 60 | Livelihood Programs | Poverty, Entrepreneurship and Growth | 1.0 | | 61 | Flexible Microfinance | Poverty, Entrepreneurship and Growth | 2 | | 62 | Traditional Microfinance | Poverty, Entrepreneurship and Growth | 1.7 | | 63 | Vocational Training | Education | Less than 1 | | 64 | Provide BAU Inputs Like Textbooks | Education | Less than 1 | | 65 | LPG Cookstoves, Indoor Air Pollution | Environment and Biodiversity | 1.0 | | 66 | Unrestricted Roads To North East India | Infrastructure (Transport) | 2 | | 67 | Unconditional Cash Transfers | Poverty, Entrepreneurship and Growth | 0.8 | | 68 | Unrestricted Roads To Bhutan And Nepal | Infrastructure (Transport) | 1.2 | | 69 | Import And Domestic Coal For More Power | Infrastructure (Energy) | 24 | | 70 | Computer Assisted Learning | Education | Less than 1 | | 71 | Bond Market | Capital and Financial Markets | 3 | | 72 | Polders, Flood Level More Than 3m | Climate change | 0.8 | **Not ranked** (outcome PDF), with brochure BCRs where printed: - **Training of Traditional Birth Attendants** — benefits "inconclusive"; the panel "was not convinced that the international studies were enough evidence for estimating benefits in Bangladesh." - **Delaying Child Marriage with Subsidies** — brochure BCR **4**; the PDF says the analysed benefits were "solely driven by additional years of schooling," with health, nutritional and social benefits still unestimated. Rural forums later put this 5th (see below). - **Empowering Adolescent Girls** — brochure BCR "Less than 1"; the PDF cites positive family-planning evidence from Uganda but "null results" for similar programmes in Bangladesh, and incomplete coverage of other benefits. - **Strengthening Dowry and Child Marriage Laws** — brochure BCR "Less than 1"; "the researchers informed the Eminent Panel that dowry and child marriage laws have no impact on marriage outcomes." The panel still favoured keeping the laws and so excluded the item rather than rank a repeal. ### What the top items were claimed to do Figures in this subsection are from the outcome PDF's notes, except where another source is named. - **TB treatment (#1).** Tuberculosis "kills 80,000 Bangladeshis each year, constituting about 9 percent of all deaths." Standard drugs and follow-up at **Tk 7,850** per patient; benefits "**21-times** higher than costs." Paper: Anna Vassall, LSHTM. MDR-TB is much more expensive and was ranked **#23**. - **E-procurement (#2).** Wahid Abdallah (BRAC University): each taka spent on electronic government procurement would achieve **663** takas of good — the highest ratio on the brochure. Lomborg's *Daily Star* column adds that the government spends **Tk 720 billion** a year on procurement and that a shift to online bidding was estimated to cut costs by **12 percent**. The *Economist* ("How to spend it," 5 May 2016; CCC media list and Adorn blurb) highlighted this result; I did not get past the paywall ⚠️. - **Nutrition for ages ½–5 (#3).** Benefits **19** times costs. The outcome PDF says "nearly **one-in-three** children in Bangladesh under the age of 5 are considered 'stunted.'" Lomborg's *Daily Star* column, four weeks later, says "**nearly one-in-four**." I did not reconcile the two ⚠️. Paper: Jonathan Rose. - **Land-records digitization (#4).** Cost estimated at **Tk 2.8 billion**; economic-growth benefits "more than **Tk 160 billion** over the next 15 years and possibly more than **Tk 1.3 trillion** by 2070"; **Tk 619** of direct and indirect benefits per taka. Three ministries then oversaw the records "independently and with little coordination." Papers: Sultan Hafeez Rahman and Sumaiya Kabir Talukder, BIGD. - **Bus priority for Dhaka (#5).** Ranked well above general "Transport infrastructure for Dhaka" (#43, BCR 3) and the Padma Bridge (#53, BCR 1.9), which the panel called a "done deal" but still ranked. Paper: Rob Gallagher. - **Other high-rank items with stated ratios or costs:** iron and folic acid in pregnancy, #7, brochure BCR 27; psycho-social stimulation for stunting, #8, **Tk 12,450** per child per year, an estimated wage increase "worth more than Tk 1.5 million" over a working life, **18** takas of benefit per taka (Atonu Rabbani, citing a Jamaica study); immunization in urban slums, #9, "around **15** takas" per taka; hypertension medication, #10, notes **38:1** vs brochure **18** ⚠️; UDC migration services, #11, brochure 22; retrofit kilns, #12, BCR **8**, "saving more than **800** lives per year" in Dhaka (Bjorn Larsen); arsenic treatment for the worst-affected 20%, #14, "up to **17** takas"; newborn homecare, #15, **850** takas per pregnancy, "more than **8,900** infants" saved if "nearly 750,000" women were targeted; VAT reform, #16, tax-to-GDP up "nearly 1 percentage point," **Tk 100.4 billion** a year, "almost **6** takas of good" if spent on infrastructure; contraception, #17, **655** takas, "nearly half a year of extra schooling," lifetime earnings up **13.2 percent**. The panel did **not** simply follow the BCRs. Golden rice R&D has a brochure ratio "up to **329**" but was ranked only **#18**. Importing coal for power has BCRs of **23** and **24** but was ranked **#28** and **#69**. Shared diesel to replace kerosene (BCR 25) is #27. Girls' secondary education (BCR 5) and Dhaka bus priority (BCR 6) sit in the top six. That gap between the economists' ratios and the panel's median order is part of the result, not a problem to be smoothed away. Lomborg's *Daily Star* column also states the bottom of the list in moral terms: cervical cancer "kills about **10,000** Bangladeshi women each year," but "for the amount of spending that can save one person from cervical cancer, we can save nearly **50** from tuberculosis." I did not independently check that 50-to-1 comparison ⚠️. He adds that textbooks, classroom computers, expensive polders, unconditional cash transfers and vocational training "returned less than one taka in benefits for each taka spent," which matches the brochure's "less than 1" / 0.8 entries for those items. ## Youth and rural rankings These are separate from the Eminent Panel and were written up after May 2016. - **Youth forums** (CCC page): "over **700** young people (ages 18–30)" at "**sixteen** different universities across Bangladesh." Their collective top 10: (1) Boost agricultural productivity; (2) E-procurement across government; (3) Land-record digitization; (4) Mangrove protection in the Sundarbans; (5) Ultra-poor graduation programs; (6) Increase secondary education for girls; (7) Group and teach according to ability; (8) Reform VAT and automate collection; (9) Psychosocial stimulation for stunting; (10) RMG factory compliance. Agricultural productivity, which the panel ranked **#45**, is first here. - **Rural forums** (CCC page; 23 September 2016 update: nine forums, July–August 2016, "more than **200** rural citizens"): top 5: (1) Boost agricultural productivity; (2) Psycho-social stimulation for stunting; (3) Land-records digitization; (4) Newborn homecare by health workers; (5) **Delay child marriage with subsidies** — an item the Eminent Panel left unranked. ## How the claims have held up - **This is a national spending menu, not a global climate book.** Climate-change items (agricultural productivity, early warning, polders, mangrove protection, resettlement) cluster in the lower half of the panel list. Energy options include diesel, imported and domestic coal, and household solar; coal's high brochure BCRs did not put it in the top ten. I did not track how Bangladesh's later energy mix or LDC / middle-income path compares with these 2016 recommendations ⚠️. - **Health, nutrition and "best buys."** TB treatment, childhood nutrition, immunization, hypertension medication and tobacco tax are the same family of interventions that stay at the top of later CCC global lists. See [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Tuberculosis as a Best Buy (2026-09-25)|TB as a best buy (Sep 25)]], [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Chronic Disease Policies Saving 1.5 Million Lives (2026-02-12)|chronic disease (Feb 12)]] and [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Best Things First|*Best Things First*]]. - **E-procurement and digitization.** CCC impact notes record a memorandum of understanding with the Prime Minister's **Access to Information (a2i)** unit — described as a "**2-year** MoU" on the impact-highlights page and a "**3-year**" MoU in the 23 September 2016 update ⚠️. The same update says Budget FY2016–17 "emphasizes" automated VAT collection, scaling of e-procurement, nutrition, and more Union Digital Center services; I did not open that budget ⚠️. Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith is quoted promising land-records digitization "before the end of next fiscal year"; I did not check whether that happened ⚠️. Lomborg and Anir Chowdhury (a2i) wrote a *Wall Street Journal* piece on scaling e-procurement (CCC media list, 10 January 2017); I did not open it ⚠️. - **Nutrition plan.** A policy seminar is said, by GAIN's then Bangladesh country director Rudaba Khondker (quoted on the CCC impact page), to have helped "focus the Second National Plan of Action for Nutrition." A six-priority proposal was "expected to be included" in the NPAN; that is a claim of expected influence, not a documented final text ⚠️. - **Padma Bridge.** Already treated as a "done deal" in May 2016 and ranked #53. I did not open later cost-benefit updates ⚠️. - **Headline arithmetic.** The Tk 3.7 trillion / US$4 billion "1% of spending" figures, the $30 billion / $3 billion budget and aid figures, and the Tk 250 billion thought experiment were not re-derived ⚠️. - **No DCSD connection.** The Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty episode concerns *The Skeptical Environmentalist* (2001) and does not apply to this project. ## Reception - **5 May 2016:** *The Economist*, "How to spend it." Adorn's catalogue and the CCC project page quote it as "An ambitious attempt to work out the best use for scarce resources." CCC's media list dates the piece 5 May 2016 (the URL uses 2016/05/05). I did not get past the paywall ⚠️. - **9–12 May 2016:** Wide local coverage of the Dhaka conference and the 12 May handover, including *Daily Star*, *Prothom Alo*, *Financial Express*, *Dhaka Tribune* and *New Age* (CCC media list). Economic Advisor to the Prime Minister Dr. Mashiur Rahman is quoted by BSS, on the CCC impact page: "Investment in TB treatment, child nutrition, and e-government can help to save 1 person out of every 11 from death." - **11 June 2016:** Lomborg, "Can they change the country's future?", *The Daily Star* — the most detailed public column I opened in full. - **15 June 2016:** Lomborg, "Which Policies Should Have Priority?", *Project Syndicate*. I opened only the lead ⚠️. - **September/October 2017:** Lomborg, "How to Set Effective National Priorities" / "Making Government Smarter," *Foreign Affairs*. I used the passage CCC quotes on its project page; the full essay timed out ⚠️. - **25 August 2017:** *New Age* published a review of the two-volume book (CCC media list). I did not open it ⚠️. - **December 2016 and October 2017:** Lomborg presented the research to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina — an "advance copy" at an SDGs conference in Dhaka in December 2016, and the published 1,241-page set at a Bangladesh UNGA event. The October post announces a follow-on phase, **Bangladesh Priorities 2.0**, "to help implement some of the top priorities." I did not open a 2.0 report ⚠️. - Adorn's English catalogue prints welcoming lines from **Tofail Ahmed** (then Minister of Commerce), **Abul Kalam Azad** (then Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister) and **Nojibur Rahman** (then Chairman, National Board of Revenue). I have not opened the original remarks ⚠️. ## Links to his X posts and later books - National template after [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Latin American Development Priorities|*Latin American Development Priorities*]]; next in this queue is *Haiti Prioritizes* (2018). The "pick the best buys" frame is also that of [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/The Nobel Laureates' Guide to the Smartest Targets for the World 2016-2030|*The Nobel Laureates' Guide…*]] and [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Books/Best Things First|*Best Things First*]]. - TB, nutrition and chronic disease: [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Tuberculosis as a Best Buy (2026-09-25)|TB (Sep 25)]], [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Chronic Disease Policies Saving 1.5 Million Lives (2026-02-12)|chronic disease (Feb 12)]], [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Agricultural R&D $5.5bn Saving 133 Million from Hunger (2026-05-17)|ag R&D and hunger (May 17)]]. - Trade: [[Authors/@BjornLomborg/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - BjornLomborg on Free Trade Benefits Dwarfing Costs (2026-02-01)|free trade (Feb 1)]]. Trade liberalization was only **#36** on this national list (brochure BCR 10), far below the extreme Doha ratios in the 2015 global shortlist.