The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded the Article IV consultation with Bangladesh on November 27. On the same day the Executive Board also completed the third review under the Extended Credit Facility Arrangement (ECF) with Bangladesh, and approved $140.4 million disbursement, says an IMF press release.
Over the past two years, the Bangladesh economy has shown significant economic stabilization and progress in structural reforms, underpinned by the Fund-supported program. In that period, real GDP growth has averaged above 6 percent, while sustained garment exports, increasing public investment, and strong workers’ remittance inflows have supported demand and activity. Meanwhile, Bangladesh’s two...
Bangladesh has earned an “insignificant” progress in its fight against corruption in the current year, according to a survey report globally released yesterday by the Berlin-based NGO Transparency International.
Bangladesh ranked the 16
th most corrupt country in the world in the graft index, scored 27 points out of 100 this year, one point higher than the last year when it became 13
th.
Chairperson of the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) trustee board, Sultana Kamal, however, termed it insignificant, as the country’s position still remains quite low.
About a year back the Economist had an editorial piece titled “Out of the basket” and subtitled “Lessons from the achievements – yes, really, achievements – of Bangladesh.” The more in-depth piece that followed appeared somewhat bemused at how a country once labeled a ‘test case for development’ could have made such striking gains in development outcomes over the past two decades (see table 1). These gains were hard to reconcile amidst Bangladesh’s natural and Rana Plaza-type disasters, volatile politics and unfavorable rankings on governance indicators – themes which the Economist has often covered before, and after, this “achievements” piece.
Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), a civil society think tank of Bangladesh, will organise a dialogue on ‘Integrating Trade Issues in Post-2015 International Development Framework: Ongoing Debates and Potential Opportunities’ on Thursday (Dec 5) in Bali, Indonesia.
The CPD, as part of the Bali Trade and Development Symposium (TDS), will host the event on the sidelines of the ninth WTO Ministerial Conference to be held on December 3-6.
The theme of the event is ‘International Trade Governance and Sustainable Development’.
The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) completed the third review of Bangladesh’s economic program under a three-year arrangement supported by the Extended Credit Facility (ECF).
The Board’s decision enables the immediate disbursement of an amount equivalent to SDR 91.423 million (about $140.4 million) to Bangladesh. This would bring total disbursements under the arrangement to SDR 365.692 million (about $561.4 million), says an IMF press release.
The three-year ECF arrangement for Bangladesh was approved by the Executive Board on April 11, 2012 (see Press Release No. 12/129) for a total amount equivalent to SDR 639.96 million (about US$982.5 million), or 120 percent of quota.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay urged the Bangladesh political leaders on both sides to stop political violence and their ‘destructive brinkmanship’.
“Whatever their differences, political leaders on both sides must halt their destructive brinkmanship, which is pushing Bangladesh dangerously close to a major crisis,” Pillay said in a statement issued from Geneva on Sunday.
Instead, she said, they (political leaders) must fulfill their responsibility and use their influence to bring this violence to an immediate halt and seek a solution to this crisis through dialogue.
The statement came at a time when the...
