Development works lose gear as ADP implementation recorded an annualised rate of only 27.11 per cent during first seven months of this fiscal by official count-the lowest in 14 years.
Officials said Tuesday the execution rate of the Annual Development Programme or ADP was such low as some key public agencies couldn't catch up with their target development works in time.
"This happens to be the worst performance in the recent past as the government agencies even failed to cross the performance rate of the Covid period," said one official concerned.
The ADP implementation was slower as some big ministries and budget-holders, including Health Ministry, Shipping Ministry, Bridges Division, and Prime Minister's Office, performed bleak during the period, an FE analysis has found.
In the July-January period of the current fiscal year (FY) 2023-24, the government agencies spent Tk 744.64 billion or 27.11 per cent of the total Tk 2.74-trillion ADP outlay, data of the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) showed on Tuesday.
The ADP execution rate in the same period last FY2023 was even 1.05-percentage-point higher at 28.11 per cent, the government data showed.
According to IMED, the government agencies during the period of the FY2023 had spent Tk 720.90 billion, 28.11 per cent of the Tk2.56-trillion ADP.
Planning Commission and IMED officials say the government ministries and agencies failed to improve upon their capacity even after recovery from the Covid-19 impact when the project works were affected severely.
"The public ministries and agencies have been failing to improve their capacity over the years even after repeated reminders to them for expediting the development works. It's unfortunate," a Member at the PC told the FE writer.
For the current FY2024, the government has framed a Tk2.74 trillion worth of ADP for implementing some 1,400 development projects.
The FE analysis has found that the ADP-implementation rate during the July-Jan period of the previous FY2022 was 30.21 per cent, in FY2021 was 28.45 per cent, in FY2020 was 32.07 per cent, in FY2019 was 34.43 per cent and in FY2018 was 33.35 per cent.
The IMED has had available data for last 14 years since FY2011. Over the last 14 years, the ADP- execution rate this July-Jan period stood out as the lowest.
Asked about the lax going, an IMED senior official said they always monitor and evaluate implementation of ongoing projects time to time when the Project Directors are asked to expedite their works.
"The Prime Minister and the ECNEC meetings also give some instructions for expediting the project execution avoiding inflated cost and time overrun," he says.
Meanwhile, the PC, amid the lower project-execution rate, has started revising the current Tk 2.74-trillion ADP.
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