Three major indicators of the economy -- imports, remittances and foreign exchange reserves -- are likely to increase in the first quarter of the current fiscal year, a positive development for the external accounts, according to the Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dhaka (MCCI).

Importers opened a lower volume of letters of credits (LCs) in July-April for the purchase of essential commodities such as rice, wheat, sugar, crude edible oil as well as raw materials and machinery key to the industrial sector, figures from the central bank showed.

The private sector’s foreign debt decreased by 4.3 per cent, or more than $1 billion, in the second quarter of the current fiscal year following Bangladesh Bank’s strict measures to control imports.

Unpredictability has become the new normal in a world afflicted by the forces of deglobalisation amidst rising geopolitical tensions.

Bangladesh’s trade deficit shot up 53 per cent year-on-year to $27.5 billion in the July-April period of the current fiscal year as the surge in imports continued against lower export receipts, exceeding last year’s total shortfall.