Foreign direct investment (FDI) will increase by seven to eight folds in the next couple of years as the decline in power and gas supply crisis will woo more investors.
Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal said it to reporters on Monday at a briefing in his office in the Planning Commission in Dhaka.
“The power and gas supply crunch has hit hard the foreign direct investment in the country over the years. Now supplies of both are okay. So, within the next two years, FDI will reach to $7-$8 billion from the current inflow of nearly $1.0 billion,” he said.
“Just wait for two years. You will see the investment has jumped to that level as the power and energy supply is smooth at the moment,” added Mr Kamal.
The minister further said, “The investment-GDP (Gross Domestic Product) ratio has increased mainly because of higher public sector investment. From next year, the private sector investment will increase and it will reach our target in the five years plan.”
According to the provisional data of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), the investment-GDP ratio in this fiscal has increased to 31.47 per cent from 30.51 per cent.
Out of that, private sector investment-GDP ratio has increased slightly to 23.25 per cent from that of 23.10 per cent in the previous FY2017.
The public sector investment-GDP ratio, however, has boosted to 8.22 per cent in FY18 from that of 7.41 per cent in the previous fiscal.
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