1. Introduction

Bangladesh faces the challenge of achieving accelerated economic growth and alleviating the massive poverty that afflicts nearly two-fifths of its 135 million population. Strategies for meeting this challenge have included a shift away from state-bureaucratic controls and industrial autarky towards economic liberalization and integration with the global economy. These policy reforms were initiated in the mid-1980s against the backdrop of serious macroeconomic imbalances, caused in part by the declining level of foreign aid and in part by a preceding episode of severe deterioration in the country’s terms of trade. The policy reforms in the 1980s included the withdrawal of food and agricultural subsidies, privatization of state-owned enterprises, financial liberalization, and withdrawal of quantitative import restrictions. The beginning of the 1990s saw the launching of a more comprehensive reform program, which coincided with a transition to parliamentary democracy from a semi-autocratic rule. These later reforms were particularly aimed at moving towards an open economy – such as making the currency convertible on the current account, reducing import duties generally to much lower levels, and removing virtually all controls on the movements of foreign private capital. Besides, fiscal reforms were undertaken including the introduction of the value-added tax. During the 1990s, notable progress was made in economic performance. Along with maintaining economic stabilization with a significantly reduced and declining dependence on foreign aid, the economy appeared to begin a transition from stabilization to growth. In the 1980s, per capita GDP had grown slowly at the rate of about 1.6 per cent per annum; the growth rate accelerated to 2.4 per cent in the first half of the 1990s, and further to 3.6 per cent in the second half of the decade. The