The government saw a budget surplus of Tk 11,865 crore in the first quarter of the current FY due to lower spending

An independent body recommending viable prices for all commodities under its mandate, is something the government must consider.

The government has implemented a carbon tax for owning multiple vehicles to lower carbon emissions, deal with city traffic, and encourage the use of public transportation.

While local car owners are already paying high taxes for vehicle ownership, this new carbon tax will exert a heavier toll on taxpayers who own more than one car.

Our education decision-makers have a narrative that largely denies any serious deficiency in the system.

In light of the economic hardships Bangladesh has been going through, there were certain expectations from the national budget of 2023-24 fiscal year.

The government should adjust the budget expenses by cutting the allocation under the Annual Development Programme (ADP) and bringing down operating costs in order to contain inflation, said Ahsan H Mansur, executive director of the Policy Research Institute.

If we choose only 10 commodities and measure inflation, the figure will land at no less than 20 percent.

Bangladesh government should own up to its mistakes

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal yesterday said that though he is worried about the elevated level of consumer prices, the situation is still under the government’s control.

The measures taken in the proposed budget for the next fiscal year have failed to address the most difficult challenge of containing inflation, and as a result, the suffering of common people will increase further, the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) said yesterday.

The new budget has not displayed cognisance of the need for post-pandemic recovery and remedial actions.

Self-contradictory is what best describes Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal’s fifth budget, and the last of the Awami League-led government’s current term.

An underwhelming budget at a time of overwhelming crisis

We should have focused on addressing the macro-fundamentals, which would create a launching pad for the coming year’s fiscal flow.

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal today in his budget speech hoped that the ongoing stress in the foreign exchange reserves would improve in a short period of time.

The allocation for the health sector in the proposed budget for the 2023-24 fiscal year has been reduced to approximately 5 percent of the national budget from 5.4 percent in the outgoing fiscal year

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has proposed withdrawing supplementary duty (SD) on 234 imported goods and regulatory duty (RD) on 191 imported goods in fiscal year 2023-24 to aid Bangladesh’s graduation from a least developed country (LDC) to a developing one by 2026.

The reserves stood at $29.91 billion today in contrast to $42.20 billion during the same period a year ago.

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal in his budget speech revealed that more than 1.49 crore Bangladeshi workers are working in 176 countries across the world