The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) has urged the interim government to prioritise the restoration of law and order, administrative stability, economic recovery, and the reconstruction of the social sector, particularly education and healthcare.
"It is necessary to address key issues such as public distrust in law enforcement agencies, the eroding confidence within these forces, fears of future violence, and the vacancies at the highest administrative levels, which are currently exacerbated by a lack of universally recognised personnel," CPD Executive Director Dr Fahmida Khatun during a dialogue titled "Challenges and Tasks Ahead for the Interim Government" held in the capital Dhaka on Wednesday (14 August).
The event was attended by representatives from the business community, private sector, civil society, and students.
In her keynote address, Dr Khatun highlighted the economic challenges gripping the nation, including insufficient revenue collection, failure to meet government expenditure, slow implementation of the Annual Development Programme (ADP), and high levels of government borrowing from the banking sector.
She also noted the urgency of addressing rising commodity prices, increasing non-performing loans, liquidity crises in the banking sector, sluggish export earnings, declining remittance inflows, and stagnation in private sector investment.
To revitalise the economy, Dr Fahmida Khatun stressed the need for immediate actions to halt the depletion of foreign exchange reserves, curb the declining trend in imports, tackle the significant depreciation of the currency, and resolve the ongoing issues in the power and energy sectors.
For the reconstruction of the social sector, she called for the normalisation of educational institutions, enhancement of educational quality, provision of teacher training, and alignment of workforce skills with labour market demands.
She underscored the integral link between the reconstruction of the education sector and employment, particularly youth employment.
Citing a CPD study, the economist identified several factors contributing to youth unemployment, including inadequate job opportunities, poor educational standards, skill mismatches, limited entrepreneurial prospects, social barriers faced by female job seekers, and the lack of access to computers and the internet.
Furthermore, she pointed out that corruption and bribery, unreasonable experience requirements, prolonged waiting for government jobs, and financial constraints are keeping a significant portion of the youth unemployed.
She concluded by stating that urgent measures must be taken within the next three months to improve the law and order situation and achieve economic recovery.
