Bangladesh hopes to pass imminent 2nd test for LDC graduation.

A second test of criteria fulfilment for Bangladesh's graduation from the world's poor-country club or LDC is set for next month, and the government is optimistic about crossing the threshold into the transition process. Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal Wednesday expressed the hope, before the February session of a UN appraisal panel, as the country already has attained all the three criteria, although crossing over two qualifies a country for getting in a three-year transition in graduation to a developing country. The country's apex trade body recently came up with a suggestion for the government to seek extension of the transition time for final decoration--now set for 2024--to five years in order to retain the international trade concessions and privileges because of the coronavirus pandemic blowback on the economy. The finance minister reaffirmed his resolve to help Bangladesh navigate through the headwind blowing worldwide to graduate from the least- developed country (LDC) status in the next triennial review meeting of the UN Committee for Development Policy (CDP) in February. 'We hope that we'll graduate from the LDC status and thus march towards a developing nation,' he said. The Finance Minister was briefing reporters virtually after chairing two separate meetings of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs and the Cabinet Committee on Government Purchases (CCGP). Bangladesh is going to get recommended for the 2nd time for fulfilling the criteria of graduating from the LDC status in the triennial review meeting of the UN- CDP to be held in February 2021. Kamal said upon fulfillment of some criteria, the UN CDP in a triennial review meeting give recommendations for graduation of a country to an upper level from the lower level. If a country can pass two consecutive assessments by the UN CDP, then it gets recommended for graduation. Bangladesh was recommended for LDC graduation by the CDP in its triennial review in 2018 as the country had met the graduation criteria in Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, Human Assets Index (HAI), and Economic Vulnerability Index (EVI), he mentioned. The finance minister said if Bangladesh could fulfill all the three criteria in the second review or assessment in February, then the country would be able to come out of the LDC bloc and thus move towards the next stage. 'We're hopeful that we'll overcome the second assessment through fulfilling all the...