The country is getting ready to welcome the New Year 2016 after attaining significant development in the field of economy in the outgoing year 2015 that drew global attention, reports BSS. After showing strong rebound in 2014 driven by political stability, the economy advanced further this year towards higher and sustainable growth trajectory. The most significant achievement in the outgoing year was the increase in the Gross National Income (GNI), which brought the prestigious lower-middle income status from the World Bank. The World Bank on July 1 last announced that Bangladesh became a lower-middle income country as its GNI per capita reached $1,310, exceeding the minimum GNI income threshold of $1,046 for graduating from the LDC (least developed country) category. The higher GNI was supported by the stable economic growth that showed prospect of further improvement, and prompted the major development partners upgrade their growth forecast. The World Bank has raised the forecast for the economic growth for this fiscal year to 6.5 per cent on account of stronger consumption, export growth and near-term political stability. The ADB also raised the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) to growth prediction to 6.7 per cent when the Inter-national Monetary Fund (IMF) lifted the economic outlook to 6.8 per cent, close to the fiscal target of 7 per cent. Appreciating the steady and stable economic growth, a leading global credit agency, Fitch Ratings, said that Bangladesh’s GDP growth had been remarkably stable even after the country suffered from both political turmoil and natural disaster. World Bank’s Chief Economist Kaushik Basu, who visited Dhaka in December, said Bangladesh could attain 8 per cent GDP growth in next three years, with addressing infrastructure development, good governance and internal resource mobilisation. A major global bank HSBC in a report in July said on macroeconomic stability, Bangladesh is the best placed as compared to Vietnam and Sri Lanka. Earlier in another report, HSBC included Bangladesh in a group of 26 economies – along with China, India and several Latin American and African countries – where it expects strong growth. Leaders from Asia-Pacific countries praised Bangladesh and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for promoting the concept of Blue Economy regionally and globally in the post-2015 development debate. The country in December 11 won the Child and Youth Finance International (CYFI) Country Award 2015 from Asia and the Pacific region for massive financial inclusion activities, particularly with Bangladesh Bank’s mooted school banking. CYFI is a Europe based global network of 36 million children and youth across 125 countries that works for enhancing the financial capabilities of children and youth. Bangladesh Bank’s innovative inclusive financing programmes earned national and global accolades. The Banker (a subsidiary of the Financial Times) and Euromoney magazine (a subsidiary of Euromoney), awarded Atiur Rahman as the ‘Best Central Bank Governor of the Year in Asia’. He also received the International Gusi Peace Prize. Earlier, the New York Times termed Bangladesh as the next most potential economic giant and said the country showed strong promise of higher growth despite various challenges the nation of 160 million people is facing.
