The political elites of Bangladesh will need to give priority to issues of concern and should not allow political confrontation to undermine their class interest. This is crucial to safeguarding the interest of Bangladesh economy and the livelihood concerns of common citizens ahead of the electoral transition.
CPD analysis of the closing data for FY13 and early signals of FY14 exposed both upside opportunities and downside risks facing the Bangladesh economy at the current juncture, and suggested that the incumbent policymakers would need to redefine the fiscal goal posts, promote credit expansion in private sector, maintain support to crop sector and contain potential inflationary pressure.
The observations came at a CPD media briefing on the state of the Bangladesh Economy in FY14, prepared under the Independent Review of Bangladesh’s Development (IRBD) programme, on Tuesday, 22 October 2013 at CPD office.
Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya, Distinguished Fellow, CPD made the presentation, which has been prepared in the context of three months following the announcement of the National Budget and three months preceding the National Election.
The analyses included record of the Bangladesh economy’s performance through the prism of the political business cycle (PBC), with a view to identifying the implication in terms of fiscal mobilisations, public expenditure, growth performance and fiscal deficit as manifested in the past National Elections in Bangladesh.
The presentation also addressed FY14 benchmarks, macroeconomic and the budgetary targets for the current fiscal year; and reviewed the movement of a set of key indicators for the first quarters of FY14, based on analyses of the latest information. CPD had earlier termed fiscal framework to be the weakest link in the FY14 Budget and the review observed that subsequent development have proved CPD’s analyses to be correct.
Professor Mustafizur Rahman, Executive Director, CPD delivered the welcome speech while CPD senior researchers – Dr Fahmida Khatun, Research Director; Ms Anisatul Fatema Yousuf, Director of Dialogue and Communication; Dr Khondaker Golam Moazzem, Additional Research Director; Mr Towfiqul Islam Khan, Research Fellow, also Coordinator of CPD IRBD Team; and Research Associates Mr Md. Zafar Sadique, Ms Farzana Sehrin, Ms Umme Salma, and Programme Associates Mr Gazi Joki Uddin and Mr Mohammad Afshar Ali were present.
The briefing was followed by a Q&A session and widely attended by print and electronic media.
[box title=”Downloads“]Bangladesh Economy in FY2014: Three Months after the Budget, Three Months before the Elections