Dhaka: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Wednesday projected that the GDP growth in the current fiscal year will inch up to 6.7 per cent from 6.6 per cent in FY2015 due to stronger readymade garment exports and growing domestic consumption.

‘The current growth momentum is expected to be strengthened raising the GDP growth to 6.7 per cent in FY2016 and 6.9 per cent in FY2017,’ said ADB Country Director Kazuhiko Higuchi.

He was addressing a function at its office while releasing the Asian Development Outlook, 2016.

The Bangladesh government earlier set a 7 per cent GDP growth target for the current fiscal.

According to the Asian Development Outlook 2016, Higuchi said, Bangladesh’s short-term economic outlook remains broadly positive.

‘The higher growth will be driven by readymade garment export and a resilient domestic consumption. The growth is likely to be reasonably broad-based with stronger performance by manufacturing,’ he added.

ADB Principal Country Specialist and Bangladesh Country Team Leader Mohammad Parvez Imdad made a power-point presentation on the Development Outlook 2016.