Economic Adviser Dr. Salehuddin Ahmed has said the government will not propose a national budget with a large deficit.
He made the remark on Tuesday (May 13) while responding to a question from journalists following a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Government Purchase Advisory Council, which he chaired at the new Secretariat building.
“We will implement a realistic budget. We won’t go for a budget with a massive gap. We’re not going to take on big mega projects by borrowing heavily and running large deficits,” he said.
Dr. Salehuddin further stated, “We won’t take large loans from banks or print money to finance such spending. Of course, there will be some level of deficit, but we’ll negotiate project funding with the IMF and World Bank.”
When asked whether the upcoming budget would be smaller than the previous one, he replied, “You’ll find that out in due time.”
Regarding the meeting, the adviser said, “We’re facing a slight shortfall in edible oil. We’ve discussed the import of rice bran oil. Most of the proposals were from the Ministry of Water Resources—six projects in total. The rest relate to food storage infrastructure. A decision has also been made on importing LNG.”
