Describing three successive devastating floods in Bangladesh in recent months, he called for immediate international assistance for rehabilitation of agriculture, physical and social infrastructures.

Saifur also expressed concern over sharp rise of oil prices that could aggravate the sufferings of the countries being affected by the trade liberalisation, including the phasing out of the multi-fibre arrangement (MFA).

He urged them to scale up investment and minimise "inappropriate constraints" on public investment in infrastructure to help countries, particularly disadvantaged ones, to mitigate their sufferings.

The finance minister, also governor of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) for Bangladesh, was addressing the plenary session of the 2004 annual meetings of the two Bretton-Woods institutions in Washington DC on Sunday, according to a message received here yesterday.

"In a democratic political order, reforms cannot be sustained without broad-based public support system within the constitutional, parliamentary and judicial framework," he told the session, explaining the reason for designing reforms as per respective country needs.

"The direction, sequencing and phasing of reforms must, therefore, be left to the countries themselves as performance of a country cannot be properly measured without an appreciation of its historical, cultural and socio-political context," he said to underpin his plea.

Saifur said the poor must be given access to meaningful education, health and adequate physical infrastructure to help them participate in the global market on equal terms.

"Globally the pledges of development assistance stand at no more than one-third of what is needed for achieving Millennium Development Goals," he pointed out.

He underscored the importance of increasing conventional ODA and emphasised the urgency of innovative financing such as proposed International Financing Facility and Global Taxation for Aid.

Turning to Bangladesh perspective, the finance minister enumerated the government's reform initiatives in fiscal consolidation and successes in reaching some Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in social sector.

He informed the meeting that despite shortfalls in disbursement of external assistance, the foreign-exchange reserve of Bangladesh increased to a satisfactory level through efficient economic management.

He assured the multilateral donor agencies of the government's commitment to implement the reform programme as envisaged in the Poverty Reduction Strategy of Bangladesh despite the devastation caused by the recent floods.

Members of Bangladesh delegation, including Bangladesh Ambassador to USA Syed Hasan Ahmad, Governor of Bangladesh Bank Fakhruddin Ahmed, Secretary of ERD Mirza Tasadduq H Beg, Finance Secretary Zakir Ahmed Khan and Commercial Councilor Fakhrul Ahsan were present at the meetings.