The CPD launched its annual flagship report titled State of the Bangladesh Economy in FY2009-10 at a media briefing on 6 June 2010 at the CPD Dialogue Room. Professor Mustafizur Rahman, Executive Director of CPD made the presentation while Dr Uttam Kumar Deb, Head of Research; Dr Fahmida Khatun, Additional Director, Research; and Dr Khondaker Golam Moazzem, Senior Research Fellow of the centre along with other members of the CPD-IRBD team were present at the press briefing. The assessment report noted that the actual growth for the current fiscal year would be 5.5 per cent rather than the targeted 6 per cent. Revenue collection was on track during the first 10 months; however, failure in achieving the collection target from non-NBR sources might result in a shortfall by Tk. 2,400 crore or 3 per cent of the total revenue target.
Reporting that inflationary pressure was continuing to mount, Professor Rahman noted that point-to-point inflation and food inflation has risen to 8.8 per cent and 10.8 per cent respectively, and the trend was found to be similar to what was experienced during 2007 and 2008. On the issue of power crunch, Professor Rahman observed that power shortage was imposing an unsustainable burden on the economy; however, the government was yet to start implementing the required initiatives, such as PPP in power generation. Recalling the government’s plan to generate 9,500 MW electricity by 2015, Professor Rahman urged for more focus on sequencing the policy measures towards achieving this target. He also explained to the media that though industrial term loan and import of capital machinery were showing positive signals, growth would not gather sufficient momentum unless the acute energy and infrastructure crises were solved. A higher economic growth of 6.5 per cent would be possible only if the country was able to ensure adequate energy and infrastructure facilities, he added.
While discussing the macroeconomic outlook of the forthcoming fiscal year, Professor Rahman highlighted some major challenges, such as implementation capacity, prudent fiscal management, and policy coherence in view of the ‘growth versus stability trade-off.’ Professor Rahman reminded that the next fiscal year should be synchronised with the targets set in the Sixth Five-Year Plan and the Ten-Year Perspective Plan.