Stress on payments eases

Bangladesh performed better than expected in its current account balance last fiscal year as the central bank's monetary measures seemed to be working, officials said yesterday.
In 2010-11, the surplus in current account balance widened to $1.4 billion from Bangladesh Bank's projection of $564 million, according to statistics released yesterday. Bangladesh recorded a $3.72 billion surplus in current account balance in fiscal 2009-2010.
Huge imports and low remittance growth piled pressure on the balance of payments through much of the last fiscal year.
In June, import pressure was lower than the previous month. Exports and remittance increased slightly.
The import payment fell to $2.91 billion in June, from $3.29 billion in May. The central bank asked banks to cut loans to non-productive sectors and advised them to discourage unnecessary overseas purchase after import pressure mounted and the taka depreciated against the dollar.