Ministries and divisions have submitted proposals seeking revision of 33 projects, mostly for time extension, in the first two months of FY25, indicating slowing down of the trend seeking cost hike and time extension of projects.聽聽聽
Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division officials said that the submission of proposals in July-August of FY25 came against the backdrop that the current interim government was identifying politically motivated and redundant projects to reduce the size of the Annual Development Programme.
The interim government, assuming power on August 8, has been facing many challenges on the economic front, including shortage of dollars and revenue crunches, left behind by the ousted Awami League regime.
The division鈥檚 officials said that the proposals seeking time extension were mainly projects on sectors, including infrastructure, agriculture and water resources.
They also said that the number of such proposals had dropped considerably in the first two months, compared with the overall 375 projects proposals seeking time extension in FY24.
They, however, said that the actual trend would be clear in the later part of the current financial year when ministries and divisions would pursue the planning ministry for revision of projects.
Time and cost overruns reduced economic benefits of the development projects and also caused wastage of public funds, economists said.
Besides, revision of projects, especially those implemented with foreign loans, put adverse impact on debt payment, said Mustafa K聽Mujeri, former director general of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies.
The country faces an increasing pressure of foreign debt payment which grew to Tk 37,307 crore in FY24 from Tk 12,018 in FY21.
The foreign debt payment growing more than three times is a big concern, said Mujeri.
The Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division officials said that the immediate past political regime also adopted steps to check the growing trend through project revision bringing some successes.聽聽
The planning ministry received around 50 less project revision proposals in FY24 than it did in FY23, they said
In FY23, it received 426 proposals for revision of projects.
Around 1,321 projects have been implemented in the annual development programme for FY25 at an estimated Tk 2.65 lakh crore of which Tk 1.65 lakh has been projected to be drawn from the local sources and rest Tk 1 lakh to be borrowed from the foreign sources.
Planning adviser Wahiduddin Mahmud has already asked the members of the commission not to extend the tenure of the unnecessary projects even if progresses of such projects are good.
He said that the interim government would give priority to job generation and foreign funded projects.
Economists said that the interim government should also accelerate the annual development programme implementation for the benefit of the economy.
The ADP implementation rate in the first two months of FY25 was 3.84 per cent compared with 3.85 per cent during the same period of the FY24, according to the IMED monthly update.
Former World Bank Dhaka office chief economist Zahid Hussain noted that better implementation of ADP was helpful for the rise in local private investment and job generation.
