Dhaka
Bangladesh’s trade deficit in the first half of the current 2019-20 fiscal year (July 2019-June 2020) soared by 5.41 percent to 8.22 billion U.S. dollars year on year, showed the central bank data Wednesday. The Bangladesh Bank (BB) data showed the country’s import payment was 27.06 billion U.S. dollars, down 5.89 percent, in July-December period of the current fiscal year while earnings from exports stood at 18.84 billion U.S. dollars, also down 2.72 percent, during the same period. The BB data showed the gap between Bangladesh’s export earnings and import payments in July-December period of previous 2018-19 fiscal year (July 2018-June 2019) was 7.80 billion U.S. dollars. A central bank official said strong growth in remittances as always helped Bangladesh cushion the impact of trade deficit. Bangladesh’s overall remittance inflow rose by about 26 percent year on year to 9.40 billion U.S. dollars in the first half of 2019-20 fiscal year. Bangladesh’s trade deficit in the last 2018-19 fiscal year squeezed by over 15 percent to 15.49 billion U.S. dollars compared with that of a year earlier, according to the data of the country’s central bank.—Xinhua
