The provisional estimates of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) did not capture the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on Bangladesh economy in the last fiscal year (FY20), according to a leading think-tank of the country.
Moreover, the provisional estimates of the GDP indicate that Bangladesh economy was already losing its steam even before the Covid-19 pandemic, added an analysis of the think-tank.
Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) made the observation during a virtual media briefing on Sunday morning while presenting its reaction on the provisional estimates of the country’s GDP growth in FY20.
In the second week of August this year, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) released the provisional estimates on its website, which showed that the growth rate was 5.24 per cent in FY20 while it was 8.15 per cent in FY19.
While the GDP growth estimate in FY20 by the BBS is the lowest of the last decade, in view of the current context it is ‘surprisingly high’, according to the CPD.
“In view of the ramification of the pandemic for the Bangladesh economy in FY2020, there was a general consensus among experts and practitioners that the GDP growth rate will be significantly lower than the planned target of 8.20 per cent,” added the CPD reaction.
“All economic activities were affected prominently during the almost two-month long ‘general holiday period’, at varying degrees concerning all sectors of the economy,” it also mentioned.
CPD had earlier estimated that the GDP growth in FY20 would not be more than 2.5 per cent.
World Bank projected that the growth rate would range between 2.0 per cent and 3.0 per cent while International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected it at 3.80 per cent.
Thus the latest release of the GDP estimate for FY20 has ‘sparked another fresh round of discussions and debates.’
“The weaknesses in GDP estimation and dearth of real-time data were exposed by the GDP estimates in the time of pandemic when there is a heightened need for credible real time data,” observed CPD.
“Indeed, more than half of the provisional GDP estimates are not based on credible real time data,” it said adding that this is also reflected when the variation of sectoral GDP growth rates are examined.
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