The country's development programme implementation scenario has shown a sign of recovery in the third quarter (Q3) of the current fiscal year (FY), 2021-22, as the execution rate during the July-March period was recorded at 45.56 per cent, official data showed.
During the first three quarters, the ministries and agencies spent Tk 989.35 billion, which is 45.56 per cent of the Tk 2.17-trillion revised annual development programme (RADP), the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) data showed.
In the same period of FY 2021, the project implementation rate was 41.92 per cent.
After a meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) on Tuesday, Planning Minister M A Mannan said the rate is 3.64 per cent higher than the corresponding period of the previous FY.
The RADP implementation rate has increased during this nine-month period despite the pandemic - due to sound management of the government alongside hard work of the common people, he added.
Although the project implementation rate in this fiscal is a bit higher than the Covid-ridden last fiscal, the public agencies still fail to touch their performance levels of two years ago (pre-pandemic level), insiders said.
Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the project implementation rate was 47.22 per cent.
Meanwhile, the government cut the development programme outlay to Tk 2.17 trillion from the original ADP of Tk 2.36 trillion for the current FY.
A senior IMED official said the public agencies fail to take their project execution rate to the desired level, although the Covid-19 pandemic impact on the project works was very minimal in FY 22.
He noted that they are visiting the project sites across the country every month for monitoring the ongoing development works in a bid to expedite project execution.
"But the government agencies have implemented only 45.56 per cent of the project works under the RADP, which is unexpected. In the remaining three months (April-June), the agencies have to execute the remaining 55 per cent of the project works."
The last-moment, quick-execution trend would ultimately affect quality of the development projects, he added.
kabirhumayan10@gmail.com