Muhith lauds ADB role in growth, dev

Finance Minister AMA Muhith yesterday hoped that the ADB and other development partners would join Bangladesh as before to overcome the challenges ahead of the country and shift on to a higher trajectory of development, reports UNB. 
"The increased requirement of foreign resources, especially investment, will present a challenge for Bangladesh during the transformation of the economy. We hope that the ADB and other development partners will join us as before to overcome those challenges and to make our journey from the present level to a higher trajectory of development," he said.
The Finance Minister was delivering his statement at the 50th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors at the Pacifico Yokohama Conference Center.
He said that Bangladesh is now a lower-middle income country and its target is to become an upper middle-income country by 2021 and a developed country by 2041 which require huge investments.
"While much of the additional resources will need to come from our national savings there will also be a need for drawing on foreign funding sources,"
Noting that Bangladesh attaches great importance to its crucial and time-tested partnership with the ADB, Muhith said twenty-three percent of the development assistance of the country last year came from it.
"Bangladesh happens to be the fifth largest recipient of ADB assistance. We sincerely expect that our mutual and meaningful relationship will continue to grow further," Muhith said. He said that the ADB recently launched its Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) 2016-2020 aligning it with the Seventh Five Year Plan (FY 2015-2020) of the Government while the CPS aims to scale up lending to Bangladesh to US $8 billion during 2016–2020 from US $5 billion during 2011–2015. He again urged the Manila-based lending agency for working together for the maintenance of standards and made a new appeal for transformation of assistance from goods and services to more of knowledge transfer. Muhith also requested ADB President Takehiko Nakao to take proactive steps on operational issues saying, "On operational issues of ADB, I think efficiency in project preparation and implementation, reduction in time delays and cost overruns, internal process reforms, procurement and contracting reforms, strengthening of resident missions through decentralization and greater delegation of power, are some key changes whose implementation can no longer be delayed."

Briefly touching upon the emerging global macro-economic scenario, Muhith said global economic growth is picking up with a long-awaited cyclical recovery in investment, manufacturing, and trade (World Economic Outlook) as the Worldwide economic growth is expected to rise from 3.1 percent in 2016 to 3.5 percent in 2017 and 3.6 percent in 2018.
Developing Asia continues to drive the global economy and South Asia remains the fastest growing of all sub-regions, he said.
Acknowledging that ADB plays an important role through its Regional Cooperation and Integration (RCI) efforts for accelerating economic growth, reducing poverty and economic disparity, and rising productivity and employment, Muhith said the ADB has proved itself to be an effective development partner that is willing to hold hands of its clients  as and when necessary and assist them with flexible and timely action. 

Muhith lauds ADB role in growth, dev

Finance Minister AMA Muhith yesterday hoped that the ADB and other development partners would join Bangladesh as before to overcome the challenges ahead of the country and shift on to a higher trajectory of development, reports UNB. The increased requirement of foreign resources, especially investment, will present a challenge for Bangladesh during the transformation of the economy. We hope that the ADB and other development partners will join us as before to overcome those challenges and to make our journey from the present level to a higher trajectory of development, he said. The Finance Minister was delivering his statement at the 50th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors at the Pacifico Yokohama Conference Center. He said that Bangladesh is now a lower-middle income country and its target is to become an upper middle-income country by 2021 and a developed country by 2041 which require huge investments. While much of the additional resources will need to come from our national savings there will also be a need for drawing on foreign funding sources, Noting that Bangladesh attaches great importance to its crucial and time-tested partnership with the ADB, Muhith said twenty-three percent of the development assistance of the country last year came from it. Bangladesh happens to be the fifth largest recipient of ADB assistance. We sincerely expect that our mutual and meaningful relationship will continue to grow further, Muhith said. He said that the ADB recently launched its Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) 2016-2020 aligning it with the Seventh Five Year Plan (FY 2015-2020) of the Government while the CPS aims to scale up lending to Bangladesh to US $8 billion during 20162020 from US $5 billion during20112015. He again urged the Manila-based lending agency for working together for the maintenance of standards and made a new appeal for transformation of assistance from goods and services to more of knowledge transfer. Muhith also requested ADB President Takehiko Nakao to take proactive steps on operational issues saying, On operational issues of ADB, I think efficiency in project preparation and implementation, reduction in time delays and cost overruns, internal process reforms, procurement and contracting reforms, strengthening of resident missions through decentralization and greater delegation of power, are some key changes whose implementation can no longer be delayed. Briefly touching upon the emerging global macro-economic scenario, Muhith said global economic growth is picking up with a long-awaited cyclical recovery in investment, manufacturing, and trade (World Economic Outlook) as the Worldwide economic growth is expected to rise from 3.1 percent in 2016 to 3.5 percent in 2017 and 3.6 percent in 2018. Developing Asia continues to drive the global economy and South Asia remains the fastest growing of all sub-regions, he said. Acknowledging that ADB plays an important role through its Regional Cooperation and Integration (RCI) efforts for accelerating economic growth, reducing poverty and economic disparity, and rising productivity and employment, Muhith said the ADB has proved itself to be an effective development partner that is willing to hold hands of its clients as and when necessary and assist them with flexible and timely action.