The government expects the economy will grow at 7.5% in the upcoming 2015-16 fiscal year with political tension easing further.
It has revised down the current fiscal year’s GDP growth estimate to 6.8% from 7.2% due to the political unrest over the last three months.
Meetings of Fiscal Coordination Council and Budget Management Committee disclosed the estimates yesterday at the Finance Division auditorium with Finance Minister AMA Muhith in the chair.
Finance Secretary Mahbub Ahmed, Bangladesh Bank Governor Atiur Rahman, National Board of Revenue Chairman Nojibur Rahman and secretaries of different ministries attended both of the meetings, said the meeting sources.
Fiscal Coordination Council meeting said investment situation in the fiscal year is not good but the government expects the investment situation will improve and as a result, the revenue earning and growth rate may increase.
If the earnings from initial public offerings and other two sectors will be included in the FY15 GDP, the growth will increase from the present estimate of 6.8%, according to the meeting sources.
After the meeting, finance minister told the journalists that the economy in the FY2014-15 is expected to grow at around 7% and at above at 7% in the FY205-16.
He said the revised budget outlay of this fiscal year might reduce to Tk2,40,000 crore from Tk2,50,000 crore.
The sources said the country’s revenue earning would be Tk1,75,000 crore in the current fiscal year from estimated Tk1,82,000 crore while the NBR revenue is estimated to be Tk1,35,000 crore.
The meeting also discussed that the coming fiscal year’s total outlay will be Tk2,92,000 crore and Annual Development Programme will be Tk92,500 crore.
Of Tk92,500 crore, an amount of Tk56,800 crore will come from foreign sources and the remaining part from the government exchequer.
It is also estimated that inflation in the next fiscal year would be 7.5%. In the current fiscal, the Point to Point inflation was 6.27 in March.
The FY16 ADP has focused on eight sectors including education, health and agriculture and ICT sector.
Source: Dhaka Tribune
