Tourism stimulus disbursement begins

Bangladesh Bank yesterday started to implement the loan disbursement process for the tourism sector with a view to helping them make a comeback from the business slowdown.

On July 15, the central bank declared a stimulus package worth Tk 1,000 crore to revive businesses run by hotels, motels and theme parks in the tourism sector.

A business will get a maximum of 30 per cent in loan against working capital taken from the respective bank previously.

If a hotel has not taken any fund in the form of working capital, banks will have to assess its loan capacity before giving out the credit, according to a central bank notice.

Owners of hotels and theme parks having trade licences will be able to get loans from the scheme in the form of working capital at a 4 per cent interest rate.

Banks, however, will enjoy an 8 per cent interest rate as the government will provide the remaining 4 per cent as subsidy, according to a central bank notice. The loans will have to be used to provide salaries of employees.

Hotels, motels and theme parks will have to calculate the wages of their employees given the average salaries of the previous three months from the application submitted for the stimulus fund.

Lenders will disburse the fund to the employees through their bank or non-bank financial institution's accounts.

Clients will have to apply for the stimulus fund between November 1 this year and October 31 in 2022.

Banks that intend to disburse the fund under the package will have to sign a participation agreement with the central bank.

The repayment tenure is a maximum of one year.

The fund will be treated as a refinance scheme as the central bank will provide 50 per cent of every loan from the package.

Businesses of the sector which had earlier taken loans from other stimulus schemes of the BB will not be allowed to avail loans under this new scheme.