Threats for Bangladesh’s businesses: Inflation, macro-economic volatility, geopolitical tension ranked top: PwC Survey

Staff Reporter :
Inflation, macro-economic volatility, and geopolitical conflicts stand out as major business threats in Bangladesh for the next twelve months, according to PwC’s, an global Professional services firm, annual global Chief Executive Officer (CEO) survey 2023.
Forty seven percent of the participants identified inflation as a major threat for doing business in Bangladesh for next one year where other 44 per cent thinking inflation threats their business in next five years.
About one-third of the CEOs participated in the survey, thinking macro-economic volatility will hamper their business in upcoming twelve months. 22 per cent participants said, geopolitical conflicts will impede business in Bangladesh in next one year whereas 28 per cent told that it is a long term threat as well.
In terms of business threats here, CEOs feel that these three issues are potent enough to compound and reinforce each other. For example, the recent geopolitical uncertainties have increased fuel costs in Bangladesh, which in turn increased the cost of electricity while rising inflation hiked the prices of raw materials.
Survey participants also marked the increasing social inequality, health risks, climate change, and cyber risks issues as major risk factors for doing business in Bangladesh for coming days.
The survey titled “26th Annual Global CEO Survey 2023: Bangladesh perspective” conducted by PwC where 32 CEOs participated from Bangladesh. At the same time, the survey also polled 4,410 CEOs in 105 countries across the world.
Less than 50 percent of CEOs in Bangladesh are optimistic about the long-term economic viability of their businesses and
think their current business model will be viable for more than ten years. By contrast, as per global findings of the survey, 59 per cent of CEOs worldwide believe that their businesses will last more than ten years.
More than half of the CEOs surveyed in Bangladesh are confident that their business revenue growth will continue for the next 12 months as well as in upcoming three years.
Further, most of the CEOs of Bangladesh feel that it’s crucial for them to reinvent their businesses to become future-ready. They also going to face near-term challenges, starting with
the local economy, which nearly 69 per cent think will see declining growth during the year ahead, as per major survey findings.
Meanwhile, on global contest, nearly three quarters (73 per cent) of chief executive officers (CEOs) of companies worldwide surveyed believe that, the world economic growth will decline over the next 12 months, while 40 per cent of top executives think their organizations will not be economically viable in a decade, according to the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) 26th Annual Global CEO Survey that revealed the gloomy business outlook.