Bangladesh Bank Offers Cheap Loans to Non-RMG Exporters. Buyers Are Waiting with ESG Checklists.
Bangladesh Bank’s Tk 3,000 crore Export Diversification Refinance Scheme opens doors for leather, jute, pharmaceuticals, and ICT exporters at 7% interest. The case for diversification is overwhelming — RMG accounts for 80%+ of exports and that concentration is a systemic risk.
Bangladesh Bank Put Tk 1,000 Crore Behind Green Industry. That Changes the Signal.
Every previous Bangladesh green finance scheme channelled donor or foreign credit line money. This one is different. Bangladesh Bank’s new Tk 1,000 crore Green Industry Refinance Fund is capitalised from the central bank’s own resources. It covers 70 categories of green products and projects. It is a revolving fund — capital replenishes as loans are repaid. When the central bank puts its own balance sheet behind green industry, every commercial bank in the country receives a message about where priorities lie.
Bangladesh Targets $1B a Year from Carbon Markets. Thailand Shows What It Really Takes.
FY27 budget: 11 new Article 6 carbon projects. Half the coastal mangrove belt under carbon trading. $1 billion annually in projected carbon revenue. These are real ambitions — Bangladesh genuinely has the carbon assets. The problem is that in April 2026, Thailand sold 49,717 verified carbon credits to Switzerland. Bangladesh has not sold one internationally verified unit. The difference is entirely institutional: Thailand built the MRV system first. Bangladesh announced the revenue target.
Three Years of Advocacy. One Budget Line. ActionAid Called It a Milestone. Who Gets the Benefits?
ActionAid Bangladesh and JETnet-BD called FY27’s solar tax reform ‘a milestone for just energy transition.’ They are right. Bangladesh’s civil society, industry associations, climate researchers, and global buyers demanded this reform for three years. The duty is gone. But a milestone is a point on a journey, not the destination. The harder question — whether the solar transition benefits reach the 300-worker SME in Savar, not just the 10,000-worker factory in Gazipur — is where the real work begins.
Tk 51,746 Crore for Climate. Up 26%. Is Bangladesh Building or Just Defending?
Bangladesh’s FY27 climate budget: Tk 51,746 crore. Up 25.57% from FY26. But 75.2% — Tk 38,906 crore — goes to flood control, embankments, and coastal protection. The Climate Change Trust Fund received Tk 100 crore. That is 0.2% of the climate budget. A growing budget that is structurally weighted toward defending what exists rather than building what is needed is not a climate strategy. It is organised retreat.
Bangladesh Just Made Solar Cheaper Than Ever. But a 23% Budget Cut Could Slow the Green Transition.
Bangladesh removed the 58.6% import duty on solar equipment and made solar power tax-free until 2035 — the strongest fiscal push for renewable energy in the country’s history. But in the same budget, government spending on energy infrastructure fell by 23%. Solar is now cheaper to buy. The bigger question is whether Bangladesh is still investing enough to power the transition at scale.