The IMF Executive Board approved Friday US$ 732 million emergency assistance for Bangladesh under the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) and Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) to address the challenges posed by COVID-19.
Bangladesh’s economy has been severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic with weaker domestic demand and a sharp decline in exports and remittances, said an IMF press statement.
The government has scaled up health and social protection expenditures to mitigate the pandemic’s impact on the population and adopted several stimulus measures to preserve economic activity.
The Board approved a disbursement of about US$ 244 million under the RCF and a purchase of about US$ 488 million under the RFI. This will help finance the health, social protection and macroeconomic stabilisation measures, meet the urgent balance-of-payments and fiscal needs arising from the COVID-19 outbreak, and catalyse additional support from the international community.