Anisur Rahman Khan :
Amid the global and local economic crisis, the government has taken various austerity measures to cap the forex reserve, but the increasing rate of foreign debt is evidently showing the sign of concern in the days to come.
Various data shows that the external debt has been more than doubled in last five years and it is increasing abnormally.
The country’s foreign debt has increased to $ 93.23 billion or 9,323 crore dollars, which debt was 45.81 billion dollars or 4,581 crore dollars in the fiscal year 2016-17.
At the end of March of the last fiscal year 2021-22, the debt has increased to $ 93.23 billion or 9,323 crore dollars. It is more than eight lakh 76 thousand crores in Bangladeshi currency, which is about 21 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP).
Most of the major debt is taken by the government, which is 73 percent.
Meanwhile, the private sector has taken 27 percent loan during this period. Industry stakeholders believe that it will create pressure on the public and private sectors to repay the large amount of foreign loans.
According to them, the pressure on the country will increase to pay the installments of the foreign debt along with the payment of import liabilities. Foreign loans are needed to overcome the current crisis. If the situation can’t be handled, the nation may face a bad situation.
According to the data of the central bank, the amount of loans from foreign sources to the public and private sector was 45.81 billion dollars or 4,581 crore dollars in the financial year 2016-2017. Of this, 36.78 billion dollars or 4,678 crore dollars were long-term loans and short-term debt was 9.03 billion dollars, which is 15.6 percent of the total GDP. And the growth of foreign debt was 11.3 percent.
The growth of external credit was as high as 19 percent in FY 2020-2021. The total foreign loan was 81.57 billion dollars or 8,157 crore dollars during the period.
In the nine months of 2021-2022 financial year till March during this period, another $11.66 billion or 1,166 crore dollars has increased.
Apart from the government, foreign loans are also increasing in the private sector in the country.
At the end of 2017, the amount of country’s foreign loans in the private sector was $12.28 billion or 1,228 crore dollars.
In the last five years, the amount of foreign debt in the private sector has increased to about $25 billion or 2,498 crore dollars, sources said.
The most amounts of foreign loans have increased during the Corona pandemic period in the private sector.
About $10 billion dollars of loans have been taken during the period, 70 percent of which are short term.
