Average production of large and medium manufacturing units grew 9.02 percent in the July-March period of the fiscal year 2022-23, compared with the 16.5 percent growth recorded in the same period of the previous year, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics.
Data also revealed that imports declined by about 12 percent in the July-March period of FY23. Bangladesh depends on various inputs particularly, in textiles for producing export goods.
The BBS assessment utilized data from 2,040 public and private factories producing apparel, textile, food products, leather and leather goods, basic metals, chemicals, and chemical products, fabricated metal products sans machinery, pharmaceuticals, and non-metallic mineral products.
An official of the Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association said knitwear export orders have declined and are likely to decline further in the coming days. They blamed recession in buying countries for instance acute recession in Germany, a major export market for Bangladesh, has impacted textile exports. The textile players are generally not hopeful of exports revival in the near term.
Another setback that the textile industry encountered in the last few months was the gas and power crisis in Bangladesh. Industrialists say the global market situation has affected domestic industrial production. The fallout of Covid-19 and the Russia-Ukraine War has made the global market unstable and sales dropped significantly.
The US and the EU have lowered their imports by more than 13 percent and 15 percent, respectively.
Production growth in Bangladesh slowed significantly in the July-March period of 2022-23 due to the global economic slowdown and gas and electricity shortages at home, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).
The slower manufacturing growth is also reflected in the GDP growth estimate of 6.03 percent for the previous fiscal year compared to 7.1 percent in FY22. Economic experts suggested the government move away from import control measures, such as limiting or delaying opening letters of credit, ad selecting import products.
Moreover, they pointed out that the taka’s depreciation against the US dollar by 25 percent over the past year should be enough to restrain imports and drive appropriate resource allocation. The depreciation has provided a boost to exports that still have good potential as the “China Plus One” geo-economic strategy is taking deeper roots.
Industrial growth in Bangladesh declines by half in July March 2023
