Md Fazlur Rahman

The year 2020 could have been a watershed for Bangladesh. Policymakers would have put their heads together and looked at what have been achieved and what went wrong in order to set targets accordingly to become a prosperous and developed nation.

But people had to spend the entire year fighting against the deadly virus to keep their heads above water as the pandemic headwinds have brought the whole world to its knees.

Amid distress and devastation everywhere, businesses were in a testing situation that they had not experienced at least in the last two decades.

It was kind of an endurance test for the economy, and so far, it appeared to be a winner, despite bruises.

“Endurance is the call of the day. And we are doing that,” said Ahsan H Mansur, executive director of the Policy Research Institute of Bangladesh.

There were debates about GDP growth figures, but even naysayers have agreed that there was positive growth.

In fact, Bangladesh’s economy grew the highest in Asia and the third-highest in the world in 2020, when only 23 out of 190 economies managed to post positive growth, according to the International Monetary Fund.

“Growth is not a major concern during situations like this. Managing to survive is the most important thing,” said Zahid Hussain, a former lead economist of the World Bank’s Dhaka office.

The battle against the pandemic showed the real character of Bangladeshi people, businesses and the economy.