FROM PAGE B1

The size of the budget for FY25 could be set at Tk 7,97,000 crore, an increase of only 4.9 percent from the current fiscal year.

Historically, governments raised the size by 12 to 13 percent. The same trend was maintained in FY24 as well.

One of the objectives of the IMF programme is to limit the budget deficit to 5 percent to control higher inflation and ease forex pressure.

While revising the ADP, the government usually doesn’t reduce the allocation from its own coffer. However, it cut the budget since the forex pressure shows no sign of diminishing.

The revised budget may trim the tax generation target for the National Board of Revenue by Tk 20,000 crore to Tk 410,000 crore. In the past 11 years, the agency has not been able to attain the collection goal set by the government.

The NBR raises about 87 percent of the revenues generated by the government.

The overall collection target is about Tk 5,00,000 crore in FY24 and it might be increased to Tk 5,40,000 crore in FY25. This means a revenue growth target of 4.5 percent would be fixed in FY25 whereas it is around 16 percent in the current budget.

The government’s target is to bring down inflation to 6.5 percent in FY25 against 6 percent in FY24. The goal for the current fiscal year might be missed and the World Bank has already said inflation would stand at 9.6 percent in June.

It will target a gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 6.75 percent in FY25. The economic growth goal is expected to be revised downwards to 6.5 percent from 7.5 percent for FY24 since almost all macroeconomic indicators are under pressure.

In the last fiscal year, the GDP grew at 5.78 percent.