Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal strongly protested the World Bank (WB)’s comments on the growth of Bangladesh’s gross domestic product (GDP) and asked the institution to amend its recently published report by next month.
He urged the WB to sit with Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) to gather knowledge on the questions it raised on different government data and bring necessary changes in its Bangladesh Development Update (BDU) report.
“I am urging the WB to sit with concerned department of the BBS to get clarification on the government data. And then the Bank will have to amend its report by May this year,” he said while briefing journalists in the city on Wednesday.
Earlier on Monday, the World Bank published its BDU report April 2018 at its office in Dhaka where it expressed doubt on the government’s projection of 7.65 per cent GDP growth for the current financial year (FY 2017-18) and raised question over different data and statistics.
The WB forecasted a 6.5 per cent GDP growth for the current fiscal.
“The WB and Asian Development Bank have no data. They use our data and analyse the economic scenario of Bangladesh. They never generate data. They just give their assumptions on the economic issues based on our data,” Planning Minister Mr Kamal said.
There is no scope of assumption on the economy, he added.
