Published : 05 Apr 2026, 09:25 PM
Updated : 21 Aug 2026, 03:33 PM
As high inflation is straining family budgets, Finance Minister Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury has raised concerns that war in the Middle East will not only fuel an energy crisis, but also raise food prices.
He said, "The fuel crisis is an additional crisis. A catastrophe. The problems I mentioned are like beating a dead horse. That is all happening through the fuel crisis.
"It isn’t just the fuel crisis. All commodity food items will be affected. Everything will be affected. The total supply chain is being impacted and there is no doubt that the prices of everything will increase in the coming days."
The finance and planning minister made the remarks to the media after a national-level multi-stakeholder consultation meeting to review Bangladesh's readiness to graduate from Least Developed Country (LDC) status.
While highlighting the problem, Khosru said: "We are currently caught up in circumstances. We are just putting out fires. A battle is ongoing to salvage the economy, and we are trying to do it. The question of graduation (LDC) isn’t even coming up.
"All the indicators of the economy are going down. Caught up in this fight, the question of graduation does not come up. And on top of that, the impact of the problem that Bangladesh is seeing in the Middle East is very big. We are bleeding Bangladesh's government funds. We are firefighting every day."
He said, "The management of Bangladesh’s liabilities has become a big problem. The financing that we will do in the future will have a very high cost. And all of the steps we have to go through for capacity building after all this is stated in the BNP manifesto. If we are able to tackle the work in the BNP manifesto on time, we will, In Sha Alalh, implement them.
"With that implementation, the capacity building that has been spoken of will be done. Only then will we be ready. Only then will we go towards graduation. There is no chance of going towards graduation at this moment."
He also repeatedly pointed out that Bangladesh is not ready for LDC graduation at the moment.
Regarding the extension request, he said: "We are asking for a date extension. So, when that extension is granted, the issues that we have to tackle in those three years to ensure our readiness are all stated in the BNP manifesto. Our readiness has been aligned with the BNP manifesto because we made the manifesto with those things in mind. And, In Sha Allah, we are implementing them one by one in a timely manner.
"So, we think that if we can implement them, we will be ready and then we will graduate. That is the current Equatorial Report that will go to Washington, to Brussels. Bangladesh's case is very strong, as I have stated. In this context, there is no chance of graduation."
Regarding the rising prices due to the war, Khosru said, "When the supply chain is disrupted, it is not an internal matter of any country, it is a global matter. Oil prices have doubled in America, and increased by 25 percent in Sri Lanka.
"But we have not increased it yet. But how long can you go without increasing it? Since we are an elected government, we are trying not to put pressure on the people. But at some point, the government will not be able to take this pressure. And if the pressure cannot be taken, if the government continues to bleed funds like this, the people will ultimately suffer."
