Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) - The central bank of Bangladesh has started preparations to formulate its new monetary policy aimed at curbing inflation without hampering the country’s overall economy growth, officials said.
“The existing monetary policy may be continued in the next six months of this fiscal year,” a senior official of the Bangladesh Bank (BB) said without elaborating.
The central bank of Bangladesh announced its ongoing accommodative monetary policy on January 30 last to achieve an inclusive economic growth by facilitating productive sectors while keeping inflationary pressure under control.
The central bank, however, has increased its policy interest rates three times during the last six months period of this year to curb inflationary pressures on the economy.
As part of the preparations, BB Governor Atiur Rahman will sit with the representatives of country's think tanks including Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) and Policy Research Institute (PRI) on July 8.
Besides, the central bank will seek opinions from former finance advisers of the caretaker governments, former central bank governors and former finance ministers on July 12, the BB officials said.
"The overall growth performances and possible inflationary pressures on the economy will come up for discussion at the meetings,” another BB official said.
He also said the central bank would finalise its new monetary policy in line with the stakeholders' opinions.
“We expect that the new monetary policy will be announced by the third weeks of this month after completing our preparations,” another BB official said.
The central bank officials said the new monetary policy is designing giving top priority to curb inflation and helping the productive sectors aiming to achieve maximum economic growth.
The country's inflation as measured by consumers' price index (CPI) moved slightly in the month of May last on the annual average basis mainly because of increase in prices of food items.
The inflation rate moved up to 8.67 per cent in May 2011 from 8.54 per cent of the previous month on the annual average basis, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) data.
On the other hand, the point-to-point inflation rate came down to 10.20 per cent in May last from 10.67 per cent of the previous month.
BBN/SSR/AD-07July11-8:30 pm (BST)
