The Bangladesh famine of 1974 unfolded between roughly March and December of that year, three years after Bangladesh' s war of independence had already badly disrupted the country' s economy and society. Severe flooding along the Brahmaputra River destroyed crops and rural employment in the months before the traditional hungry season, while government mismanagement of food distribution and the smuggling of food grain across the border to neighboring countries worsened the shortage; the Bangladeshi government' s own contemporary estimate placed the death toll at 27,000, while later expert analyses attribute closer to 1.5 million deaths to the famine, one of the worst recorded anywhere in the 20th century.
Facts
Classification
Type/ClassificationAgricultural Famine or Disaster 1 Milestone Year Connections
Associated With
Rice, Crops Flood damage to the rice crop, Bangladesh's staple, and rice price shocks are central to accounts of the 1974 famine.
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Sources
1. Bangladesh famine of 1974 (Wikipedia)
Lead paragraph, milestone kind
The Bangladesh famine of 1974 (Bengali: চুয়াত্তরের দুর্ভিক্ষ, romanized: Cuāttōrēr Durbhikkhō) began in March 1974 and ended around December of the same year. The famine is considered one of the worst in the 20th century; it was caused by government mismanagement, food grain smuggling to neighboring countries and flooding along the Brahmaputra River among other issues, resulting in high mortality.
Lead paragraph, start year
The Bangladesh famine of 1974 (Bengali: চুয়াত্তরের দুর্ভিক্ষ, romanized: Cuāttōrēr Durbhikkhō) began in March 1974 and ended around December of the same year.
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