UPDATES AS GOVERNMENT PROPOSES BUDGET TO PARLIAMENT; CHANGES HEADER, DECK, LEDE, EDITS THROUGHOUT
By Faisal Mahmud
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AA) - Bangladesh on Thursday unveiled a 7.97 trillion-taka ($67.5-billion) national budget for its next fiscal year, aiming to curb inflation.
Finance Minister AH Mahmood Ali proposed the budget, which in all likelihood is going to pass in an opposition-less parliament.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of Awami League came to power in January for the fourth consecutive term in an election boycotted by the main opposition -- which sat out of the poll in fear of rigging.
This budget marks the country's 54th overall, the Awami League government's 25th in six terms, and the 21st under Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's leadership across different tenures.
The budget for the country’s next fiscal year – which runs from July to June – aims to restore the country's economy to its former strength, with the theme "pledge towards building a happy, prosperous, developed and smart Bangladesh."
This year's budget is a contractionary one, with a lower GDP growth target of 6.7%. Also, the budget size increases by less than 8%, a significant deviation from the usual 10-12% growth compared to the previous year's budget.
In the lead-up to the budget, the country's general inflation rate hit a seven-month high of 9.89%, driven mainly by rising food prices.
Ali disclosed that the government has targeted to keep inflation at 6.5% for the next fiscal year.
Economists of the country, however, said this was “not feasible.”
“The real inflation is more than 12%,” economist Khondokar Golam Moazzem told Anadolu, “I don’t think keeping it under 7% will be possible considering the current economic conditions.”
Bangladesh's once-stellar economic growth has faltered, besieged by a triple crisis of soaring inflation, an unstable exchange rate, and rapidly depleting foreign reserves in the past couple of years.