Rejaul Karim Byron

The International Monetary Fund has insisted on quarterly reporting of GDP and an updated base year for computing inflation data to enable policymakers to make more time-befitting decisions.

The visiting mission of the International Monetary Fund has called for a pricing formula for fuel, fertiliser, electricity and gas by next fiscal year and cut back on subsidy spending to efficient budget financing.

Known knowns -- is what best sums up the prognosis of the visiting International Monetary Fund mission so far as it looks to thrash out the conditions for the prospective $4.5 billion loan.

The International Monetary Fund asked Dhaka to withdraw the interest rate cap on lending, report net foreign currency reserves and introduce market-based exchange rate to secure a $4.5 billion loan from it as budget support.

Bangladesh will continue to see high deficit in its current account balance till 2027, predicts the International Monetary Fund.

Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant Project may see a cost rise due to slow progress in power grid upgrade, possible changes in the loan repayment method amid the Russia-Ukraine war and the devaluation of the taka.

Without having a feasibility study done, the Election Commission sent a proposal for a development project worth Tk 8,711 crore for purchasing two lakh electronic voting machines and their management.

The second and final reactor of the Rooppur power plant will be installed today -- marking the most important development in the construction of the country’s first nuclear power-source.

Bangladesh is hoping to get $5.5 billion from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank as budget support, which will help the country shore up its depleting foreign currency reserves.

The revenue collection growth decelerated to 12.63 per cent in Bangladesh in the first quarter of the current fiscal year, driven by the cost-of-living crisis at home and abroad, narrowing the fiscal space for the government, official figures showed.  

The International Monitory Fund has outlined wider reform measures, including bringing discipline to the financial sector and boosting revenue collection, for Bangladesh to avail the $4.5 billion loan.

Development spending in Bangladesh rose 36 per cent year-on-year in September despite the government’s efforts to cut expenditures in a bid to save US dollars.  

The International Monetary Fund has cut Bangladesh’s growth forecast to 6 percent for fiscal year 2022-2023.

People in rural areas were hit harder by food and non-food inflation than those in urban areas over the last two months, with the overall inflation surging to a 10-year high of 9.52 percent in August.

The government has approved a project to revive four canals of  Dhaka to reduce the capital’s waterlogging woes.

The Tk 10,460 crore Ghorashal Palash Urea Fertiliser Factory project, taken up four years ago, is likely to cost 48 percent more and take two more years to be completed.

Employers in Bangladesh required nine out of the last 10 jobseekers they hired in the past five years to possess at least basic digital literacy and skills, found an Asian Development Bank (ADB) and LinkedIn survey.  

The growing number of people from Bangladesh registering for work overseas indicates that international migration from the country may soon surpass pre-pandemic levels, according to a recent report by the World Bank.

The Asian Development Bank is ready to give over $20 billion to finance Bangladesh’s road and railway projects but raised concerns over the timely implementation of schemes.

A Bangladesh delegation will discuss a $4.5 billion loan with International Monetary Fund officials in Washington next week.