Staff Correspondent: The country’s inflation has dropped to 8.91% in October from September’s 9.10%, Planning Minister MA Mannan said citing Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) data.

The planning minister disclosed the inflation data information during a meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) chaired by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday.

Bangladesh’s inflation escalated to 9.5% in August due to rising commodity prices and record hike in fuel prices. However, it declined to 9.1% in September.

According to BBS data, general inflation, with the 1995-96 base year, jumped to 11.97% in September 2011. Subsequently, the base year was updated to 2005-06 as 11.97% was the highest in the past 20 years.

With the new base year, the average inflation of the 2010-11 fiscal year stood at 10.91%. Point-to-point inflation has not exceeded 9% in any month since then. As such, inflation in August and September is the highest in the last 11 years.

Following the Ecnec meeting Planning Minister MA Mannan told reporters, “We have to be discriminatory and careful while choosing projects and approving them. However, we will not compromise about small projects, rural projects, and development projects. Only in case of large projects we have to be careful and research deeper into it.”

The minister said, “The prime minister emphasised that not only do we have to avoid being wasteful we also have to be frugal. We have to avoid luxuries in all walks of life.”

“We have to put more importance on agriculture. We have to produce any kind of food we can. We have to be self-sustainable so that in case of a crisis we can at least live on our own food,” he added.

The prime minister also directed deputy commissioners to visit the areas under their jurisdiction to see if there is any land left uncultivated.

“We cannot force people to produce crops but we can motivate them and offer any kind of help they might require,” said the minister.