In a move that is seen as an effort towards strengthening the foreign reserves, Bangladesh has recently reduced the size of the Export Development Fund (EDF) by US $ 200 million from US $ 5.2 billion even if just in a span of five months, EDF size has come down to US $ 5 billion from US $ 7 billion.
This is as per reports, which underlined the size of the fund was downsized from US $ 7 billion to US $ 6 billion in December last year even as later it was gradually reduced to US $ 5.2 billion.
Meanwhile, as per some central bank (Bangladesh Bank) officials, to secure the second tranche of the US $ 4.7 billion IMF loan, Bangladesh’s net foreign currency reserve must stand at US $ 24 billion by June this year and the Bangladesh Bank has very few options to do that rather than downsizing the EDF as import costs have already been brought down and there is little growth in exports.
