DHAKA, Feb. 12 (Xinhua) -- Bangladesh's trade deficit in the first half of the current fiscal year 2023-24 (July 2023-June 2024) narrowed over 63 percent to 4.59 billion U.S. dollars year on year, said the Bangladesh Bank on Monday.
The central bank data showed that the country's import payment was 30.58 billion dollars, down 19.8 percent, in the July-December period of the current fiscal year, while earnings from exports stood at 25.99 billion dollars, up 0.64 percent, during the same period.
The data showed the gap between Bangladesh's export earnings and import payments in the July-December period of the previous 2022-23 fiscal year was 12.31 billion dollars.
Remittances helped Bangladesh cushion the impact of the trade deficit. The inflow of remittances from Bangladeshis increased by 2.9 percent year on year to 10.79 billion dollars in the first half of the fiscal 2023-24.
Bangladesh's trade deficit in the fiscal year 2022-23 dipped 48.41 percent to 17.16 billion dollars. ■