The Center for Policy Dialogue (CPD) believes that the government is going to face a huge revenue deficit in the current fiscal year (2023-2024). The organization claims that there will be a deficit of Tk. 82 thousand crores at the end of this financial year by monitoring the ongoing trend of revenue collection for the past six months.
Fahmida Khatun, Executive Director of the organization, said this at a media briefing on CPD's recommendations in the national budget for the financial year 2024-2025 at CPD's office in Dhanmondi on Saturday (March 16).
Urging to bring inflation under control, Fahmida Khatun said that the prices of daily commodities are rising. This has made the life of low income people very miserable. Despite adequate production, prices of commodities are rising due to manipulation.
He said that the budget is going to be formulated at a time when the overall economy is in a negative trend. High inflation in the country, liquidity crisis in banks, slow and slow pace of budget implementation, declining foreign exchange reserves and declining export earnings and remittances. Given this, our macroeconomic stability is not where it should be, especially with high growth and low inflation, among other indicators that we would like to see. Rather, it is under extreme pressure. The reasons for this are both international and domestic.
The main budget of the financial year 2024-2025 will be how to restore the stability of the macro economy, he added, how to face those challenges and recover the economy is a big issue. For example, the revenue collection target for the last six months was 36.3 percent. But till December the receipt is only 13.9 percent. If we want to achieve the target, we have to achieve 54.4 percent growth in revenue collection in the remaining 6 months which is very difficult. If you look at the trend of the past days, it can be seen that the revenue growth will continue as before. I think the amount will be Tk. 82 thousand crores.
CPD suggested bringing back relief in the currency market. The organization said that there is a liquidity crisis in the bank. Low foreign exchange reserves have put pressure on the economy. This situation needs to be overcome.
Calling to increase the speed of revenue collection Fahmida Khatun said reforms are needed for expected income. Government borrowing needs to be reduced. It suggests providing allocations for assistance to backward communities.