Govt making each effort to keep country's economy vibrant: PM Hasina

Prime minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday told Parliament that the government is making all sorts of effort to keep the country's wheels of economy running despite the economic recession caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine-Russia war.

"The government is making each effort to keep the country's economy vibrant despite the economic recession caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine-Russia war," she said.

The Premier told the House while responding to a tabled question of ruling party lawmaker MA Latif, elected from Chattogram, at the prime minister's question-answer session.

The Leader of House said that the government has been able to quickly bring the country's economy back to the pre-coronavirus high growth trend by dealing with the recession, inflation and instability in the global economy due to the Coronavirus pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war, which impacted negatively to the country's economy.

"Despite the severe Covid-19 crisis, our growth in the financial year 2019-20 was 3.45 per cent, the highest in the world for that period," she added.

As a result of the various steps taken by the government to boost the economy, the GDP growth in the financial year 2020-21 has increased by 6.94 per cent, said Sheikh Hasina, adding that "It further increased to 7.10 per cent in FY 2021-22."

At this time, she highlighted various measures taken by the government to keep the economy of the government alive.

These are included government expenditure rationalization, social protection, subsidies in electricity, energy and agriculture sectors, export incentives, increase in remittance flows, monetary policy etc.

Replying to the query of Jatiya Party lawmaker Syed Abu Hossain, elected from Dhaka, the prime minister highlighted the various steps taken by the government to control the prices of daily commodities and said that as a result of the government's activities, it has been possible to control the prices of daily necessities and the poor people are being benefited from it.

Answering to another question of Jatiya Party lawmaker elected from Pirojpur, Rustam Ali Farazi, the head of government said that it will be possible to start rail traffic on the Dhaka-Mawa-Bhanga section of the Padma Bridge Rail Link Project by September 2023 and the Jessore section from June 2024.