Govt working on assessing total stakes in SOEs
Wednesday, 2 December 2009
S M Jahangir
The Ministry of Finance has started assessing the government equities in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) under an initiative to streamline the overall assets and debt recovery system, official sources said.
"A process is underway to calculate the overall government stakes in the state-owned entities," a senior official said.
Under the initiative, the debt management wing of the finance ministry earlier asked the SOEs to submit their annual financial statements to the ministry to help hasten the assessment process, official sources said.
The finance ministry issued the directive following a decision to this effect at a recent meeting with senior officials and representatives of a number of SOEs at the Secretariat, the ministry officials said.
The main purpose of the initiative is to create a database on overall position of government equities in the SOEs and also to streamline both realisation of government dividend or profit from those enterprises and payment of grant or subsidy to them.
Another important purpose of the initiative is to improve the operational efficiency of the SOEs.
The Debt Service Liability (DSL) wing of the Finance Ministry has already been given the responsibility of preparing a 'comprehensive' database, said the official.
The DSL branch will publish a manual on the overall position of the government stakes in all the SOEs, he added.
Currently, about 44 SOEs are in operation in seven sectors other than the financial institutions.
According to provisional official figures, the net losses of all the SOEs came down significantly to Tk 1.54 billion in the fiscal year (FY) 2008-09 from Tk 99.82 billion of the FY 2007-08.
The SOEs saw such a drastic fall in the losses as some enterprises, including Petrobangla and Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), made significant profits last fiscal, though they posted losses in the previous fiscal.
The BTRC made a profit of Tk 32.38 billion in FY 2008-09 against the net loss amounting to Tk 373.3 million in FY 2007-08. Petrobangla's profit last fiscal stood at about Tk 10.76 billion compared to the previous fiscal's loss of Tk 10.26 billion.
The SOEs, however, paid an amount of Tk 4.14 billion as dividend to the government exchequer in the FY 2008-09 compared to Tk 443.80 million in the FY 2007-08, the figures showed.
On the other hand, the government's payment of grant or subsidy to about 14 SOEs also crossed Tk 8.36 billion in the last fiscal, up from Tk 4.94 billion of the previous fiscal.
The Ministry of Finance has started assessing the government equities in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) under an initiative to streamline the overall assets and debt recovery system, official sources said.
"A process is underway to calculate the overall government stakes in the state-owned entities," a senior official said.
Under the initiative, the debt management wing of the finance ministry earlier asked the SOEs to submit their annual financial statements to the ministry to help hasten the assessment process, official sources said.
The finance ministry issued the directive following a decision to this effect at a recent meeting with senior officials and representatives of a number of SOEs at the Secretariat, the ministry officials said.
The main purpose of the initiative is to create a database on overall position of government equities in the SOEs and also to streamline both realisation of government dividend or profit from those enterprises and payment of grant or subsidy to them.
Another important purpose of the initiative is to improve the operational efficiency of the SOEs.
The Debt Service Liability (DSL) wing of the Finance Ministry has already been given the responsibility of preparing a 'comprehensive' database, said the official.
The DSL branch will publish a manual on the overall position of the government stakes in all the SOEs, he added.
Currently, about 44 SOEs are in operation in seven sectors other than the financial institutions.
According to provisional official figures, the net losses of all the SOEs came down significantly to Tk 1.54 billion in the fiscal year (FY) 2008-09 from Tk 99.82 billion of the FY 2007-08.
The SOEs saw such a drastic fall in the losses as some enterprises, including Petrobangla and Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), made significant profits last fiscal, though they posted losses in the previous fiscal.
The BTRC made a profit of Tk 32.38 billion in FY 2008-09 against the net loss amounting to Tk 373.3 million in FY 2007-08. Petrobangla's profit last fiscal stood at about Tk 10.76 billion compared to the previous fiscal's loss of Tk 10.26 billion.
The SOEs, however, paid an amount of Tk 4.14 billion as dividend to the government exchequer in the FY 2008-09 compared to Tk 443.80 million in the FY 2007-08, the figures showed.
On the other hand, the government's payment of grant or subsidy to about 14 SOEs also crossed Tk 8.36 billion in the last fiscal, up from Tk 4.94 billion of the previous fiscal.