Satisfied, but not ecstatic: Govt reacts to Doing Business ranking

Despite moving up eight positions and achieving an additional 3.03 points the government is not ecstatic, said Salman F Rahman, advisor to the prime minister in a press briefing today.

Rahman was reacting to the Ease of Doing Business Rankings of the World Bank, published earlier today. 

For the first time, Bangladesh has been recognized as a Top-20 improver and secured a ranking of 168 in Doing Business (DB) 2020, an improvement of eight rankings from that of last year. The 2020 DB score is 45.0, which is 3.03 points higher than that of last year.

"Several government agencies have taken various reform initiatives after April this year. This is why those reforms were not reflected on the report," Salman said during the event at the prime minister's office in Dhaka. 

He also said reforms are being implemented faster than in previous years and Bangladesh may come out within the top 100 by 2021. 

Abul Kalam Azad, principal coordinator (Sustainable Development Goals) to the office of the prime minister said at the event Bangladesh was ranked low in some indicators of the World Bank's report, although on the ground the situation was different.

"Despite improvement in the power sector, Bangladesh was ranked 176, which is not reliable," he added.

Land registration system is going to become digital within a few days and this will be reflected in the next report, according to Azad.

"While Bangladesh has done well in some indices, it has not been reflected in our ranking as others have done better. Government agencies have enough room to improve in each and every indicator," Azad furher said.

On Bangladesh getting a low score in credit availability and resolving insolvency, Finance Secretary Abdur Rouf Talukder said the banking sector of Bangladesh was discussed with importance during the annual meeting of the World Bank which just ended.

Non-performing loans are being calculated here - including principal, accommodative interest, penal interest and imposed interest - making the total amount very high, which will be lower when only the principal is calculated.

"Government borrowing through savings certificate has fallen to one third in the first quarter of this fiscal, compared to the same period of the previous fiscal and the government has a surplus of about Tk14,000crore. This will help to maintain liquidity in the financial market," he added.

Najibur Rahman, principal secretary to the office of the prime minister said recently the government took up the issue of ease of doing business seriously and formulated 10 committees for the 10 indicators.

Sirazul Islam, executive chairman of the Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) sought support of all agencies to further improve in the doing business index.