Thrust on accountability in public fund management

FE Report
Speakers at seminar on Saturday emphasised on increasing revenue collection, fund allocation and ensuring transparency and accountability in public fund management in the upcoming national budget for fiscal year (FY) 2018-2019.
They also called for checking inflation, poverty alleviation, slashing economic inequality, creating more jobs and increased budget allocation for health and education sector.
The recommendations were made at a seminar titled 'An Analysis on Macroeconomic Performance of Bangladesh' organised by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh (ICAB) at its headquarters in the city's Karwanbazar.
Planning Commission member Dr Kamal Uddin Ahmed addressed the programme as chief guest while it was also attended by former ICAB president Anwaruddin Chowdhury with ICAB president Dewan Nurul Islam in the chair.
Delivering his speech, Mr Kamal Uddin said Bangladesh has been achieving higher economic growth during the past decade and the growth rate was 7.1 per cent last fiscal which was the highest in last 30 years.
With such pace in economic growth, the country will achieve an 8.0 per cent rate by 2020, he added.
The Planning Commission member also said the country will face challenges due to environment change and global warming issues that can be mitigated through green revolution in industries. Speaking at the programme, ICAB president said the country's graduation to developing country from least developed country (LDC) will open door of opportunities as well as challenges.
The country will have to achieve robust export growth to accelerate fast economic growth of the country, he said. He also said the government should give special focus on increasing remittance as it has been showing declining trend for last couple of years.
Mr Dewan also suggested to emphasis on private sector investment in the country because Bangladesh will not be eligible for low cost foreign loans with LDC graduation.
Presenting the keynote paper, ICAB member Shahadat Hossain said sufficient amount of budget must be allocated for health sector as World Health Organisation (WHO) report shows that around 5.2 million people, living under poverty line, don't have access to proper health care service.
To keep the inflation within the tolerable range through controlling the demand pull inflation, the annual money and credit growth must be consistent with the growth rate of commodities, he said.
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