Which way now for the EU?

With the main European Union (EU) institutions preparing for a change of leadership this autumn, now is a good time to reflect on the EU's priorities for the coming years. The EU's new top team is all but confirmed. Ursula...

Dengue wreaking havoc with city life

The mayor of Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) is unwilling to call the prevalence of dengue as an epidemic. He would rather wait for official confirmation by various competent authorities to give the dengue incidence the recognition of an epidemic....

Rising FDR rates and return of savers

It is a piece of good news for the banks that savers have again started coming back to their fold. The return means a lot to the banks which are now experiencing a difficult time as far as supply of...

Liquidity shortage pushes up private banks’ deposit rates

The ongoing liquidity crunch has forced many private commercial banks to raise their deposit rates, particularly that of term deposits. The hike has made the government move to lower the lending rates to single digit almost untenable. The deposit rates...

Irish PM says hard Brexit would raise issue of Irish unification

The question of the unification of Ireland and British-ruled Northern Ireland will inevitably arise if Britain leaves the European Union (EU) without a divorce deal on October 31, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said. He also warned that a so-called...

Old habits die hard: Saudi Arabia struggles to end oil addiction

When Saudi Aramco was on the verge of a deal last year to buy a stake in an Indian oil refinery, its boss quickly boarded a company jet in Paris and flew to New Delhi.Chief executive Amin Nasser arrived unannounced...

BIDA's tax-reform recipe to NBR

The Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) has requested the National Board of Revenue (NBR) to initiate some tax reforms as suggested in an action plan, prepared to help improve the country's position in the Ease of Doing Business (EODB) index.The...

Stocks crawl back into green on regulatory interventions

Stocks inched up in the outgoing week, snapping a three-week losing streak, as institutional investors came forward to stop the big declines.Week on week, DSEX, the prime index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), rose 2.56 points to 5,233.Market analysts...

Govt to build potato centre to raise export

The government will set up a potato centre in the country with state-of-the-art facilities for boosting export of the produce. "The government will set up an international standard potato centre in the country for proper preservation, development and boosting export...

Everlasting lure of Mysore

Our South Indian family tour was mostly a hectic touch-down at as many tourist sites as possible in as little time as could be spared. Such visits are nothing more than superficial, not allowing one the leisure to develop an...

Horn of Africa drought threatens re-run of famines

Humanitarian groups and the United Nations are warning of another drought in the Horn of Africa, threatening a repeat of the deadly dry spell and famine that claimed lives in Somalia and its neighbours eight years ago.The British charity Oxfam...

Getting remittance incentive right

More than three weeks have passed since the national budget for the current fiscal years (FY20) got approval. The authorities concerned are yet to devise any mechanism to provide the announced 2.0 per cent incentive on remittance. The Ministry of...

An unequal society

All our celebrations of socio-economic success conceal the cruel reality that poverty-stricken Kuril slum lies in the heart of posh and prosperous Gulshan area; the top 10 per cent of the population grabs more than one-thirds of the total income...

How best to tackle inequality in the 21st century? Start with climate change

Do you prefer to hear good news or bad news first? I will begin by giving you the (unsurprisingly) bad news. Today's world is an unequal place. Standards of living vary massively both between and within countries. To narrow it...

Integrating South Asian regional cooperation

After the colonial era, most countries of the South Asian region became independent and sovereign states. To remain aligned to their legacy, the nation states strived to form small groups aiming at establishing regional cooperation to enhance each member state's...

Fieldwork experiences in social science research

Social scientists, specifically the anthropologists, conduct their research in many ways; but the method most characteristic of the discipline is one of fieldwork based on 'participant observation'. This usually means spending a long period (a year or more) living as...

BTC against lifting fumigation rules to avert harmful impact on local crops

Bangladesh Tariff Commission (BTC) has recommended the government not to stop applying fumigation rules at the port of entry while importing US cotton to avert possible harmful impact of an infamous insect 'boll weevil' on the local crops. It also...

EFDs at taxpayers' cost?

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has been trying hard to introduce electronic cash registers, also known as Electronic Fiscal Devices (EFDs), on a limited scale for quite some time. But the move has largely remained unsuccessful. The NBR is...

Raising output of indigenous fish

That the indigenous varieties of fish are increasingly becoming short in supply is indisputable. Common people experience this on a daily basis when they try to fish from open sources or they visit a fish market. Yet not many people...

North Korea test fires short-range missiles, casts doubt on nuclear talks

North Korea fired two short-range missiles on Thursday from its east coast, a South Korean official said, its first missile tests since leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump agreed to revive stalled denuclearization talks. North Korea launched...

Brexit of political libertine Boris

Now that Boris Johnson has achieved his lifetime ambition to become the United Kingdom's prime minister, the tragicomedy of Brexit is approaching its climax. While the rest of the European Union (EU) has viewed this with barely disguised horror, there...

Govt borrowing from banks more than doubled last fiscal

The government borrowing from the banking system more than doubled in the outgoing fiscal year (FY) to partly finance its budget deficit, officials said on Wednesday.Its borrowing from the banking system rose to Tk 264.46 billion as on June 30...

Impact of lower rates on deposits: A senior citizen's perspective

The financial sector of the country has of late been struggling against severe ups & downs. As the sector is considered to be the heart of the economy, the government as well as the central bank often intervene and govern...

The ailing Dhaka WASA

A recent study by the BRAC Institute for Governance and Development (BIGD) revealed that the affluent sections of Dhaka city were wasting water supplied by Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (DWASA) on a massive scale. On the other hand,...

When privatisation creates new rentier opportunities

International financial institutions (IFIs) have typically imposed wide-ranging policy reforms - called 'conditionalities' - in exchange for country governments to secure access to financial assistance. While IFIs may demand anti-corruption policies, other IFI policy conditionalities, such as the privatisation of...

Whither market mechanism?

Higher lending rate is obviously a barrier to investment; it enhances the cost of doing business. So, there is always a demand for rate cut or lowering the lending rate. To provide the policy support for rate cut, the Bangladesh...

BB prods banks to raise exposure to share mkt

The central bank has asked some 20 banks to boost their investments in stocks to help revamp the country's ailing capital market.The banks have the scope for investing more in listed securities in line with the existing rules and regulations,...

It takes listening to children to end violence

We see many challenges that affect children around the world. Child marriage, corporal punishment, voting ages, air pollution, teachers going on strike…It's been great to speak and have world leaders at the UN listen when we talk about these issues....

Capitalism needs course correction

Capitalism as an engine of economic growth faces, of late, criticisms as global inequality is on the rise. The acting International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief David Lipton said on July 17, 2019 that the rising anger worldwide at the increasing...

WHY STUDY ECONOMICS?

I was watching a speech by Professor Zafar Iqbal at a university campus(posted on You Tube). Soon after his speech ended, I saw a student approaching the Professor who asked him, "Sir, I am a student of computer science. Why...