Country’s per capita foreign debt more than doubled

Staff Reporter :
Bangladesh’s per capita foreign debt increased to approximately Tk 64,380 or $580, (considering $1 equals to Tk111) in June 2023 compared with that of $283 in June 2017 referring per capita foreign debt more than doubled in last six years.

Per capita foreign loan represents the share of the country’s foreign debt burden that each individual citizen carries.

Bangladesh’s external debts, including public sector debts and private sector debts, reached $99 billion (about Tk1,100,000 crore) at the end of June 2023, surging from $45.23 billion in June 2017 and $23.5 billion in June 2009, according to Bangladesh Bank data.

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal, however, on October 31 said that currently the per capita debt of Bangladesh was about $365.

The amount of foreign debts until June 2023 was $62.31 billion, the minister said at the parliament.

According to the Bangladesh Bank data, the total external debts were $98.93 billion at the end of June 2023 and of the amount, the public sector took $76.67 billion ($64.57 billion was borrowed directly by the government and the rest by various government institutions) in foreign credit and short-term foreign loans in the private sector were $22.25 billion.

The country’s foreign debt surged by 51 percent from $65.27 billion in June 2020 to $98.93 billion in June 2023, a $33.6 billion increase in three years, according to the Bangladesh Bank data.

Finance Ministry data showed that the total government debt, including domestic and foreign, reached Tk16, 17,313 crore at the end of June 2023, while the debt was Tk13,43,724 crore in June 2022.

In July 2021, the exchange rate per dollar in the country was Tk84.80, which increased to Tk111 after the central bank allowed a floating rate.

The gross foreign exchange reserves in Bangladesh, according to International Monetary Fund guidelines, dropped to $19.5 billion on November 8.

Meanwhile, the domestic debt of the country, from banking and non-banking sources stood at Tk 9.44 trillion in an annualized rise by over 11 per cent.

The government is projected to spend around Tk 943 billion on debt servicing, including both domestic and external interests in the current financial year of 2023-24.

This constitutes Tk 820 billion for domestic interest and Tk 123.76 billion for external interests.