Bangladesh Bank to discourage imports of non-cereal, processed food, foreign fruits

Bangladesh Bank today says it has decided to raise the ratio of import payments businesses must make to banks while opening letters of credit (LCs) for luxury goods, foreign fruits and non-essential items such as non-cereal food, canned and processed products.

The move is aimed at discouraging the imports of the items, said the central bank in its monetary policy statement for the next fiscal year.

On May 10, the central bank instructed banks to take up to 75 per cent of import payments in advance from businesses to open LCs for luxury and non-essential goods.

Today, the BB also said it would roll out new refinance schemes to ramp up the production of import substitute products in order to cut the reliance on foreign purchases and save foreign currencies.