Amid concerns over possible impacts of losing LDC benefits, the government is crafting a 'transition strategy' for 'smooth graduation' from the country's least-developed country status.
Officials said the economic relations division (ERD) of finance ministry is at its final stage of designing a Tk 900-million project to develop the strategy.
The five-year project, which may start early next year, will support the National Task Force for LDC Graduation to adopt the policy, they told the FE this week.
The plan comes months after Bangladesh officially met the criteria for its graduation from the LDC status.
It achieved the milestone in March after meeting all three criteria at a triennial review of the United Nations (UN) Committee for Development Policy (CDP).
As per the current provisions, a country needs to be eligible in two consecutive CDP reviews before any recommendation is made.
Therefore, Bangladesh will have to meet the same criteria again in 2021 to be recommended by the CDP for its final graduation from the LDC status by 2024.
Experts have long said this graduation may give rise to potential economic costs for withdrawal of GSP facilities from the European Union, Canada, Japan, Australia and other markets.
As Bangladesh is expected to graduate concurrently from both the UN and the World Bank classifications, options for concessional financing will also die off.
The government thus formed a task force led by the principal coordinator for SDG affairs to monitor, evaluate and analyse policy gaps and steer the process of LDC graduation.
"The main objective of the project will be to support this National Task Force to develop a smooth transition strategy," said ERD additional secretary Monowar Ahmed.
"It will critically identify the right challenges and policy gaps for intervention of the policymakers," he told the FE.
"It will also establish a consultative mechanism to ensure effective coordination of the preparatory works for developing the national strategy," Mr Ahmed added.
The ERD project will continue until 2024.
The entire financing of the project is coming from the Debt Relief Grant Assistance-Counterpart Fund (DRGA-CF) of Japan as grant, authorities concerned informed.
Meanwhile, the general economic division of planning commission (PC) is conducting a study on the possible impacts of LDC graduation on the economy.
"The zero draft of the study will be developed by next month," PC member Prof Dr Shamsul Alam told the FE.
"We'll hold a series of consultations with stakeholders on the zero draft. Based on the consultations, the final study will be produced by next April," he said.
The officials said the findings coming from this impact assessment will be input into the transition strategy.
