The government borrowing from the banking sector went down by 32.05 per cent to Tk 4,569.85 crore from Tk 6,725.81 crore in the corresponding period of FY13, according to the latest Bangladesh Bank data. BB officials told New Age on Thursday that the government borrowing from the banking sector had declined significantly in the first six months of FY14 due to a slower pace in implementation of the government’s annual development programme amid continuing political unrest.
The BB data, however, showed that the government borrowing
from the scheduled banks in
the first six months of FY14 had increased to Tk 11,268.48
crore, up by six per cent from Tk 10,629.94 crore in the same period of the FY13.
The government repaid the central bank Tk 6,698.63 crore by the end of the first half of FY14, pushing down its overall bank borrowing to Tk 4,569.85 crore.
The government has set a target to take loan amounting to Tk 25,993 crore from the banking
sector in FY14 to manage its deficit financing.
The overall government borrowing from the banking sector stood at Tk 89,227.69 crore as of December 30, 2013.
The BB data showed that the government borrowing
through the Ways, Means and Advances from the central
bank had stood at Tk 3,220 crore in the first six months of the FY14 while there was no loan through the overdraft.
Due to the lower bank borrowing by the government, the credit growth in the domestic sector slumped to 10.78 per cent in November 2013 compared with that of 14.83
per cent in the corresponding month of 2012.
The BB data showed that the credit growth in the domestic
sector had achieved only 4.46 per cent in July-November of 2013 against the six-month target of 19.30 per cent.
A BB official said that the government usually borrowed significant amount of its borrowing target in the first half of a fiscal year, but the situation was totally reversed this fiscal year.
The borrowing declined due mainly to the slower pace in implementation of the ADB in the first
half of the FY14 amid political violence, he said.
According to official figure of the planning ministry, the ADP
implementation during July-November period of the FY14 stood
at Tk 13,156 crore or 20 per cent of the total outlay earmarked in the budget.
Of the amount, Tk 8,985 crore was spent from domestic sources, while the remaining Tk 4,171 crore from lenders as project aids, according to official figure of the planning
ministry.
The budget for FY14 earmarked Tk 65,872 crore for annual development programme.
The development activities of the government has severely been hampered due to long-running
political programmes and
repeated shutdowns enforced by the opposition political parties, the official said.
-With New Age input
