Md Asaduz Zaman

Moreover, further setbacks are posed by Malaysia's decision to freeze new foreign worker recruitment in March as well as Oman suspending the issuance of visas to Bangladeshi citizens at the end of 2023 due to an oversupply of workers from the South Asian nation.

Almost 60 years ago, Kali Saha opened a small sweet shop in Savar’s Namabazar after gaining experience as an apprentice. Despite offering only roshgollas, curds, and chamchams, the name and fame of “Kali Saha Mistanno Bhandar’’ spread.

On a warm March morning in front of a state-of-the-art facility in Gazipur, employees were found to be lining up at a large gate, designated as the entry point.

The cost-of-living crisis in Bangladesh appears to have caused more trouble for daily workers as their wage growth has been lower than the inflation rate for more than two years.

Plastic money transactions fell 4.77% to Tk 3,057 crore

The proportion of working-age people declined to 65.08 percent in 2023 from 66.58 percent in 2021, according to a survey of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS). A year before, the proportion was 65.67 percent.

The dependency ratio of the people who are over 65-plus years rose to 9.4 percent in 2023 from 8.6 percent in 2022.

Spending under the annual development programme (ADP) has been going slow in the current fiscal year (FY), with implementing agencies using just 31.17 percent of the total allocation till February this year, showed official figures.

One in every four households, or 26.13 percent, that rely on agriculture for their income face food insecurity

Around 3.77 crore people experienced moderate to severe food insecurity in 2023, according to a survey by Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics.

The government is considering granting a tax exemption for foreign grants provided to local researchers in order to boost their activities and earn more foreign currency.

Gender responsive finance in Bangladesh has increased significantly over the last decade in both the public and private sectors, portraying a favourable shift toward ending the gender gap.

More women are joining the agriculture sector in Bangladesh as their job opportunities in industries, especially garment factories, have stagnated and men switch to non-farm sectors amid increased mechanisation of farming activities

The overall inflation in Bangladesh slid 19 basis points to 9.67 percent in February thanks to a fall in the prices of both food and non-food items, according to sources at the planning ministry.

The government is set to downsize the Annual Development Programme (ADP) for the current fiscal year of 2023-24 by nearly 7 percent while prioritising projects having the highest impact, according to planning commission sources.

Three out of five young women in Bangladesh were considered NEETs (not in employment, education, or training) in 2022, a waste of the workforce in a country looking to thrive riding on the demographic dividend, official figures showed.

Bangladesh’s economy grew at 6.07 percent in July-September of the current fiscal year, the first time the government has published the quarterly growth figure of gross domestic product (GDP). 

Bangladesh’s economy grew at 6.07 percent in July-September of the current fiscal year, the first time the government has published the quarterly growth figure of gross domestic product (GDP). 

The government is planning to use drones extensively to inspect and surveil public projects across the country in order to ensure quality and monitor whether contractors are doing their work properly during implementation.

Mohammad Abu Eusuf, a private sector employee who lives in Dhaka’s Mirpur, earns about Tk 23,000 per month. But the income is not adequate for him to manage his monthly expenses given the ongoing inflationary pressure.