The National Economic Council at a meeting on Sunday approved the annual development programme of Tk聽2,30,000 crore for the 2025-26 financial year with lower allocations for the education and health sectors.
The size of new ADP is smaller than the original ADP of Tk聽2,65,000 crore for the outgoing financial year (2024-25) which was taken by the Awami League government before being ousted in a mass uprising on August 5, 2024.
It is, however, Tk聽14,000 crore higher than the revised FY25 ADP of Tk聽2,16,000 crore as the interim government that assumed power on August 8, 2024, trimmed down the FY25 ADP by Tk 49,000 crore to shun unnecessary and politically motivated projects.
Planning adviser Wahiduddin Mahmud at a briefing on the day at the Planning Commission at Agargaon in the capital Dhaka said that problems like mismanagement and the wastage of public money would be curbed in the new ADP, while there would be no mega project expect the construction of Matarbari deep-sea port in Cox鈥檚 Bazar.
The interim government鈥檚 chief adviser, Professor Muhammad Yunus, presided over the NEC meeting at the Planning Commission and approved the proposal by the planning ministry.
Of the top five sectors which account for 69.93聽 per cent of the FY26 ADP, the allocation for education sector stands at Tk聽28,557 crore compared with that of Tk聽31,528.60 crore in the original ADP for FY25.
The allocation for health sector stands at Tk聽18,148 crore in the new ADP compared with Tk 20,682.88 crore in the original ADP for the outgoing FY25.
Wahiduddin, however, said that the overall allocations for the health and education sectors would increase in the forthcoming 2025-26 financial year budget.
The government will increase salary of teachers and appoint 2,500 health service providers under the non-development budget for FY26, he said.
Terming the huge number of ongoing projects 鈥榯yranny of projects鈥�, the planning adviser said that they could not give importance to any particular sector due to the situation.
He said that most of the ongoing projects needed to be completed.
A total of 1,171 projects have been included in the new ADP with 26 new and the rest 1,145 inherited from the previous regime, he added.
As usual, the transport and communication sector has been given the highest sector-based allocation of Tk聽58,973 crore, which was Tk 70,687.75 crore in the original ADP for FY25.
The power and energy sector has been allocated Tk聽32,392 crore in the new ADP, down from Tk聽40,751.86 crore given in the original ADP for FY25.
The allocation for housing and community stands at Tk聽22,776 crore in the new ADP compared with that of Tk聽24,868.03 crore given under the original ADP for FY25.
About Tk 1,44,000 crore has been allocated from the local sources for the new ADP and the remaining Tk聽88,000 crore of the programme will come from the foreign sources as loans.
The planning adviser said that they discussed sluggish implementation of the ADP in the early period of a financial year.
Identifying the way of fund release by the Finance Division as one of the reasons for the situation, the planning adviser said that more flexibility was suggested to overcome the problem.
The ADP implementation stood at Tk聽82,894 crore in the July-March period of FY25, which is 36.6 per cent of the revised ADP allocation for the outgoing financial year, the lowest nine-month implementation rate in over a decade.
In the same period of FY24, the ADP implementation rate was 42.30 per cent of the revised allocation.
A total of 200 from earlier selected 257 new projects will be executed with foreign loans under the new ADP.
The interim government dropped 57 projects after scanning all the projects taken by the past Awami League regime.
Of the projects, the Dhaka-Chattogram road improvement project worth Tk聽75,151 crore will be completed by 2031 with an estimated loan of Tk 61,186 crore from the Asian Development Bank.
It is expected that the proposed metro rail-5 project worth Tk聽47,721 crore will be completed by the same year, with a loan of Tk聽32,332 crore from South Korea.
The modernisation of Eastern Refinery at a cost Tk聽42,897 crore has been taken with a loan of Tk聽12,866 crore under negotiation with an overseas lender.
Negotiations have been going with the ADB for a loan of Tk聽28,119 crore for the development of Faridpur-Barisal-Kuakata highway with a cost of Tk聽34,919 crore.