Welcome to Bangladesh Development Portal
The General Economics Division (GED) is one of the six divisions of the Planning Commission and is headed by the Member. This division, like other technical/sector divisions, provides secretarial assistance to the Planning Commission and to the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) and the National Economic Council (NEC) in all matters relating to plan preparation and formulation of economic policies. The principle function of this division is to oversee the overall economic policy-making and economic affairs of the country. Some of the salient features of the functions of this division are as follows:
- Preparation of national, medium and long-term strategies, guidelines and plans in accordance with social, economic and political objectives as laid down by the Government;
- preparation of technical frameworks for plans of various timeframe;
- formulation of alternative strategies and policies for mobilization of domestic resources to achieve the plan objectives;
- undertake research and analysis on issues like economic diplomacy, fiscal and monetary affairs, international economics, savings and investment, employment and income distribution;
- undertake macro and sectoral evaluation of different term plans;
- estimation of national income, consumption, savings and investment, domestic resources and foreign exchange requirement, external trade and balance of payment
- preparation of memorandum for the Bangladesh aid group meetings, later termed as Bangladesh Development Forum;
- preparation of briefs for meetings and negotiations with the multilateral organizations like World Bank, IMF, UN, ADB, WTO, ESCAP, EC, ECDC, South Asian Forum as well as other bilateral development partners;
- provide staff support to the Planning Commission for Council Committee on Exports, Resource Committee, Inter-ministerial Committee on ADP, Foreign Exchange Allocation Committee and others;
- initiate and organize seminars and professional discussions on issues relevant to economic planning and development.
In 2001, the Government of Bangladesh declared the General Economics Division as the “National Poverty Focal Point (NPFP)”. As a consequence, GED has been entrusted with the following additional responsibilities:
- GED is to formulate, monitor and evaluate the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) and in this connection is empowered to make all sorts of correspondences with World Bank, IMF, other developments partners and all national and international stakeholders for PRSP;
- GED is to monitor and evaluate the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)- the UN agenda agreed by GOB;
- GED is to undertake all necessary actions to monitor and evaluate the implementation of PRSP and to oversee its post-implementation matters;
- GED, together with the Programming Division of the Planning Commission and the Finance Division is to formulate the resource envelopes and allocate resources for projects and programs in line with the poverty reduction strategies (PRSs);
- GED, through its representatives, is to participate in all pre-ECNEC and Project evaluation committees’ meetings to help judge development projects and programs in line with the PRSP
GED, in consonance with the national economic objectives, will oversee Bangladesh’s position and strategy in international forums and assist in implementation of economic diplomacy.