RIYADH, 25 July 2022, (TON): The president of Kazakhstan met with the secretary-general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Jeddah.

Kassym-Jomart Tokayev praised the great role played by the OIC in leading efforts to promote joint Islamic action and consolidate the spirit of Islamic solidarity.

He stressed his country’s interest in strengthening cooperation with the organization.

Hissein Brahim Taha expressed appreciation for Kazakhstan’s active membership of the OIC, and the country’s efforts to support the activities of the intergovernmental organization and promote joint action through various initiatives.

Taha also stressed the organization’s keenness to enhance cooperation with Kazakhstan in areas of common interest.

DHAKA, 25 July 2022, (TON): The 20th session of the Council of Ministers of Developing-8 known as D-8 will be held in Dhaka on July 27 with issues, including food and energy, high on agenda.

Foreign minister AK Abdul Momen told ‘food security and energy security have now become global issues. These will be elaborately discussed in the D-8 ministerial conference as there is much scope of cooperation in these areas among the member countries.”

He said that the energy security was now globally discussed and so it would get importance at the conference expected to be inaugurated by the prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, virtually.

The foreign minister said that tourism was another issue, which would also be discussed.

He added “Egypt, Malaysia and Turkey are mature in tourism industry. We have scope to do more through cooperation.”

DHAKA, 25 July 2022, (TON): Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina sought Japanese support for the repatriation of Rohingyas to Myanmar, their homeland, as the forcibly displaced people have become a burden on Bangladesh for the last several years.

She made this call when Japanese Parliamentary Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs Honda Taro and President of Japan International Corporation Agency TANAKA Akihiko met her at her official residence Ganabhaban.

PM's Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim told “a media briefing that the premier urged the Japanese to take initiative so Myanmar takes their displaced nationals back home in a dignified manner.”

Japanese parliamentary vice minister said “his country also wants a dignified return home of the displaced people.”

KABUL, 25 July 2022, (TON): Afghanistan’s finance ministry announced Saturday that a contract was signed for the purchase of 350,000 tons of oil from neighbouring Iran.

The agreement was signed with an Iranian firm during an Afghan delegation’s visit to the neighbouring country.

The delegation included representatives of Afghanistan Oil and Gas Corporation, ministries of finance and foreign affairs, Da Afghanistan Bank, and the National Standards Authority.

The two sides held talks on quality, prices, transit, and creating facilities for traders, and agreed to establish joint committee on expanding the gas pipelines and establishing joint refineries.

DHAKA, 25 July 2022, (TON): Bangladesh and Kenya have agreed to develop cooperation in contract farming, air connectivity, blue economy and food security.

The countries also want to strengthen cooperation between their investment authorities apart from exploring opportunities in technical exchanges, education sector and youth cooperation.

A 10-member delegation led by Moi Lemoshira, additional secretary of the ministry of foreign affairs of Kenya, joined the first foreign office consultations with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bangladesh.

The delegation will also have meetings with government agencies and apex chambers and visit export processing zones and manufacturing industries in Bangladesh.

It comprises the additional secretary of the foreign ministry, the high commissioner of Kenya in New Delhi and other officials of the Kenyan government.

DHAKA, 25 July 2022, (TON): The United States Ambassador to Bangladesh Peter Haas inspected the ongoing activities and programmes of the Rajshahi Metropolitan Police.

On his arrival at the RMP headquarters, its Commissioner Abu Kalam Siddique accompanied by Additional Commissioners Sujayet Islam and Mozid Ali welcomed the envoy.

He went round the victim support centre, cyber crime unit, operational control and monitoring centre and crisis response team and witnessed those activities.

RMP Commissioner Abu Kalam Siddique also briefed the envoy about the activities of Hallo RMP Apps, juvenile gang digital database and bomb disposal unit.

DHAKA, 25 July 2022, (TON): Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Vikram Kumar Doraiswamy has made a courtesy call on Mayor of Rajshahi City Corporation AHM Khairuzzaman Liton at the latter's city bhaban office.

Both the sides made a fruitful discussion on launching the river route from Dhulian of Murshidabad in India to Aricha in Tangail of Bangladesh via Rajshahi and train operation on Rajshahi-Kolkata route.

During the meeting, they talked to the newsmen saying they discussed the potentialities of both the river and railway routes.

Liton said “both of them agreed on the issues and the Indian envoy will take necessary steps of conveying the message to its government.”

By TON Sri Lanka

The symbols of economic disaster like Sri Lankan are looming in the feeble economic horizon of Nepal. An economic crisis similar to Sri Lanka is inevitable in Nepal, if ignores its early symptoms. There is rising assumption that the Nepali economy may crumble like in Sri Lanka as the country's foreign exchange assets have shriveled and inflation has soared with rising fuel prices.

For the first time since the 2000s, foreign exchange reserves have fallen to around $9 billion, which is hardly sufficient to fund imports for six months, down from 11 months. At the same time, price increases has hit an all-time high of 8.56 percent with the employment rate remaining as unsatisfactory as usual. Therefore, there is no reason to disregard the suspicions outright.

Before investigating into this phenomenon, it is relevant to comprehend how Sri Lanka landed in its worst economic disaster ever. Realities and figures made available by the World Economic Forum show that, like Nepal, Sri Lanka depends disproportionately on a handful of export products such as tea, rubber and readymade garments.

Earnings from tourism and remittances contribute substantially towards the net income of foreign currency. But because the product base for exports is thin and earnings from tourism and remittances often remain motionless, the country often meets balance of payments crises which stress its foreign exchange assets.

Since Sri Lanka depended on limited sources of foreign currency to finance its import growth, and foreign debt-aided development activities took place aimlessly, the island nation was often at the mercy of International Monetary Fund loans to meet the foreign exchange gap resulting from a rapidly growing trade deficit and debt servicing.

To date, Sri Lanka has received IMF loans 16 times, and all loans were based on conditions of tight fiscal and monetary policies, reduced domestic subsidies, and depreciation of the national currency to make its exports cheaper.

Unfortunately, Sri Lanka's latest IMF loan in 2016 accorded with the start of its economic collapse. As a result, it affected not only development but also added a debt weight denominated in foreign currency. Adding to this calamity, a series of events in the following years added to bitter the economy. It all start with a sheer failure in tourist influxes due to the Colombo bomb blasts in 2019 which was followed by the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. The government's illogical decision to cut taxes in 2021 only deteriorated the disaster.

Most astonishingly, the government barred the ingress of chemical fertilizers to preserve foreign currency and declared the country's farming to be 100 percent organic. The decision to prohibit chemical fertilizers and the change to organic farming showed ill-conceived as it abridged agriculture output and production, forced the country to ingress more food. The move also harmfully affected the production and exports of tea and rubber, which worked as a vital basis of foreign exchange.

Subsequently, the country progressively confronted augmented heaviness on foreign exchange reserves, forcing it to take import control measures. Import controls produced inflation to point 17 percent early this year, making a scarcity of foods, fuels, and medicines. Eventually, for the first time since its independence from Britain, Sri Lanka defaulted on its outside debt payment in May 2022, declaring South Asia's once affluent economy bankrupt.

Having observed the Sri Lankan debacle, one can be convinced that there are early signs of the Sri Lankan economic disorder in the Nepali economy. Like Sri Lanka, Nepal's trade imbalance problem is gradually getting severe. The country's trade deficit has surged to an all-time high of almost Rs1, 600 billion since the beginning of the current fiscal year.

At the same time, the balance of payments, which usually enjoyed a surplus, had faced a shortfall of nearly Rs300 billion as of the end of the last economic year. As a consequence, the Nepali money has denigrated continually, leading to soaring price levels. The steep increase in food and fuel prices is the most salient.

However, for a small and import-oriented economy like Nepal, which relies on limited and untrustworthy bases of foreign currency, it is difficult to absorb the tremor from high imports. However, given the country's external financial liabilities and the ratio of external debt to gross domestic product (GDP), Nepal is in a comfortable position to manage the crisis.

Nepal's external debt to GDP ratio is around 21 percent, compared to over 40 percent in Sri Lanka, accumulating debt obligations of about $51 billion in 2022. There are symbols of post-pandemic recovery, Nepal has ways to fend off economic contingencies.

However, despite the options available to address the structural feebleness to avert the economy from further deterioration, Nepal is floundering in odd policies and wasting resources in politically motivated surplus development schemes.

One of the reasons for Sri Lanka's crisis was investments in redundant development projects looking for foreign exchange conquered mainly by international sovereign bonds. The country also illogically presented haphazard programme targeting the problem of trade imbalance and foreign exchange shortages without success.

Thus, if the series of Sri Lankan economic incidents is any lesson for Nepal, it is essential to cope with the early symbols of the monetary adversities without deferral. Since the cause of the present economic difficulty lies in the country's severe trade shortfall problem and declining foreign exchange reserves, interference in outside trade should be given precedence.

Though, there is no possibility of taking radical steps to control imports due to the country's over-dependence on imports and poor domestic manufacturing. Nor can it expect to see a miracle in exports which are inactive.

There is no dearth of policy options. Regarding imports, there is a possibility of optimum tariff, which maximizes welfare instead of measures that illogically control imports and only help to raise inflation. The government can provide incentives that encourage innovation and entrepreneurship in exports instead of direct subsidies, which are mainly discriminatory and ineffective.

At the same time, Nepal needs to discourage development projects, particularly those that amass debts in foreign exchange with a very long development period. Whether dry ports or mega airports and fast tracks or railway tracks, any decision on investment in development projects must purpose to balanced regional progress that contributes to overall production. Political benefits at the cost of financial sagacity should be rejected by any means in this regard otherwise, Nepal will predictably face an economic crash like in Sri Lanka.

KYIV, 24 July 2022, (TON): Russian missiles hit infrastructure in Odesa in southern Ukraine on Saturday, the Ukrainian military said “dealing a blow to a landmark deal signed just the day before to unblock grain exports from Black Sea ports and ease global food shortages caused by the war.”

The deal signed on Friday by Moscow and Kyiv and mediated by the United Nations and Turkey was hailed as a breakthough after nearly five months of punishing fighting since Russia invaded its neighbor.

It is seen as crucial to curbing soaring global food prices by allowing grain exports to be shipped from Black Sea ports including Odesa.

UN officials had said “they hoped the agreement would be operational in a few weeks but it was not yet clear if that would still be possible given Saturday’s strikes.”

JEDDAH, 24 July 2022, (TON): The assistant secretary-general for humanitarian, cultural, and social affairs of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Tarig Ali Bakhiet, recently met the director general of the World Health Organization, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in Geneva.

Bakhiet, who is also the special envoy of the OIC secretary-general to Afghanistan, and Ghebreyesus discussed resource and support mobilization to strengthen the health sector in Afghanistan, and the Sahel region, including through enhancing access to vaccines.

The two sides agreed to develop a new memorandum of understanding and a plan of action to reinforce their bilateral cooperation in health and technical assistance, provision of medical supplies, training and capacity building to the benefit of the OIC member states.