Abdur Rahim Harmachhi
bdnews24.com Senior Correspondent

Dhaka, Sep 23 (bdnews24.com)—Finance ministers and central bank governors of the world are set to meet in two key international conferences—in Cyprus and Turkey--beginning on Sep 30 to work out an exit strategy from the impact of the global recession.

A high level six-member delegation from Bangladesh, led by finance minister A M A Muhith, is expected to join the two weeks of deliberations at the Commonwealth Finance Ministers' Conference and the Annual General Meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.

Commonwealth finance ministers will sit in Limasol, Cyprus, from Sept 30 to Oct 3, while Istanbul, Turkey, will host the WB-IMF annual meeting on Oct 6 and 7.

"The focus of both the meets will be the global economy… We will try to work out a strategy for coming out of the global recession within shortest possible time," the finance minister told bdnews24.com, elaborating on the agenda of the two conferences.

"Though recession has had little impact on our economy compared to others, we want to join other nations in the joint efforts to overcome the crisis," Muhith said.

"We are expecting a solution would emerge through the two key international conferences so that no such disastrous situation recurs in future."

"The two conferences are also expected to issue some guidelines including precautionary measures against possible recurrence of recession," said Muhith.

The Bangladesh delegation will include the prime minister's finance and planning adviser Mashiur Rahman, Bangladesh Bank governor Atiur Rahman, finance secretary Mohammad Tarique and ERD secretary Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan.

On the sidelines of the two conferences, the Bangladesh delegation will also hold bilateral talks with other visiting delegations and meet with top WB-IMF officials, Muhith said, adding that such talks would help boost bilateral economic ties with other countries.

About increased assistance from the World Bank-IMF group, the finance minister said, "World Bank has already informed us of what they can do for us in the next three years."

"We'll make a request for release of more funds during the first year so that we can successfully fight the impact of global recession." Muhith said, adding, "We expect the World Bank will agree to our proposal."

IMF has already granted $700 million in soft loans to Bangladesh to help the country in strengthening its economy, the finance minister said.

World Bank and IMF invite finance ministers, development affairs ministers, economists and NGO representatives from their member countries to the annual meeting to address economic challenges for poverty alleviation and development.

Bangladesh government formed a 27-member high powered taskforce in March, led by the finance minister, with representatives from the ruling and opposition parties, economists, business representatives, and others, to formulate a recession combating strategy.

The taskforce had its first meeting on Mar 24. The government announced a Tk 3,424 crore stimulus package on Apr 19 in line with the recommendations of the meeting.

On top of that, the budget for FY 2009-10 allocated an amount of Tk 5,000 crore to shield the national economy against the onslaughts of global economic meltdown.

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