Finance minister seeks UNESCAP’s support to boost regional connectivity

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal has sought support from United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) to build resilience and deepen regional connectivity through evidence-based policy analysis, capacity-building, and demand-driven regional advisory services.

"…. ESCAP can support Bangladesh to build resilience and deepen regional connectivity as well as in its efforts of strengthening regional cooperation for sustainable development through multidisciplinary analysis and support and in developing multi-stakeholder partnerships against global challenges," the minister said.

He said this while presenting his keynote speech at the third session of the Committee on Macroeconomic Policy, Poverty Reduction and Financing for Development (MPFD) of ESCAP, convened in Bangkok today on virtual platform owing to uncertainties related to the Covid-19, according to a press release.

The finance minister joined the conference on a special invitation from the Executive Secretary of ESCAP.

The sessions are convened every two years and attended by ministers and senior government officials from Asia-Pacific countries.

In his keynote speech through a video message, the finance minister shared the remarkable story of Bangladesh's development journey, focusing on the key role of regional cooperation.

He said, "Covid-19 brought enormous challenges to our development pathway but due to the extraordinary leadership of our Hon'ble Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh is on its way to bringing back normalcy in its economy."

He further mentioned that due to well-timed intervention while the global economy is estimated to see a contraction of 3%, Bangladesh is among the few economies with a positive growth rate and that was 3.5% in FY2020 and 5.5% in FY2021.

Reiterating the Prime Minister's call to the global community, in the just concluded United Nations General Assembly, he called upon the Asia-Pacific leadership to ensure universal and affordable access to vaccines for people across the region.

He further said that Bangladesh takes pride as the leading peacekeeping nation and for its contribution to global peace, Bangladesh is also eager to contribute directly to other civil operational activities of the United Nations.

He also welcomed the ESCAP's proposal of establishing a thematic advisors' group and hoped that will be able to give country-specific macroeconomic policy advice which will be helpful, to the member countries to design their appropriate macroeconomic policies.

Finance Minister of Thailand Arkhom Termpittayapaisith, Finance Minister of Indonesia Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Finance Minister of Bhutan Lyonpo Namgay Tshering and Federal Economic Affairs Minister of Pakistan Omar Ayub Khan also spoke in the opening session.