The New Nation - Internet Edition

A SEMINAR organised in the city the other day only reflected great anxieties and fears gripping more and more of the country's businesses due to power crisis which is not getting any better. The gap between power demand and its actual supply is now some 1,500 mw. Industries and services are reeling from the shortfall in supply and they maintain that production losses have climbed to as much as 30 per cent due to this factor. They apprehend even higher losses in the coming days and that would be unbearable.

Clearly, the way things are now, even the conservative projection of a 5.5 per cent economic growth in 2008 from donor agencies, looks difficult to achieve. Growth could plunge far lower than the projected figure. Some analysts are predicting stagnancy, the first time that could happen after the independence of Bangladesh. Realistically looking at it, things may not be so bad in the end. But one thing can be said with certainty that growth will very likely be squeezed hard in the present year and an outcome of this will be more joblessness and aggravation of poverty.

The government must engage in hard thinking and prompt doing of things 'immediately' to improve power supply. The tight fist should be eased to enable the fastest acquisition of power generation capacities by private operators. Currently, a set of regulations discourage the private sector from developing their own power source. The regulations need to be cut down to ensure duty-free import of generators. At the same time, PDB authorities should do their very best to increase generation from present units and supply the same in a planned manner to business-oriented consumers. For the medium and the long terms, increased generation of power from coal must be made a reality at the fastest.