✿Recent General Knowledge on the Activities of BB, Bangladesh Economy and World Affairs✿

✥ Inauguration IBFT:—Bangladesh Bank on November 2, 2017 launched the Internet Banking Fund
Transfer (IBFT) for settling interbank transactions to provide more easy, swift and low-cost banking
service to the clients. With the launching of the system, banks will settle the transactions of their clients
(one account to another account, account to credit card or debit card and debit card or credit card to
account) through internet banking using the National Payment Switch of Bangladesh (NPSB) — an
automated common platform of Bangladesh Bank for all banks to settle all inter-bank transactions.

✥ The name of the present Finance Secretary is Mohammad Muslim Chowdhury.

✥ The current per capita income of Bangladesh is US$1,610 [as per the revised data of the National
Economic Survey-2017].

✥ The GDP growth rate of Bangladesh in the 2016-2017 is 7.28% (highest in the history of the country’s
economy) [as per the revised data of the National Economic Survey-2017].

✥ Bangladesh gets the highest amount of loans from the World Bank among its multilateral and bilateral
development partners. Bangladesh received more than $1bn in loans annually from the World Bank in the
last several years.

✥ The poverty rate in Bangladesh has declined to 24.30% at the end of the year 2017 while the rate of
ultra-poor people has dropped to 6.5%.

✥ Bangladesh Bank has recently achieved 'Global Inclusion Award 2017' under the category of Global
Money Week Award for its sustainable and innovative financial inclusion and financial education
initiatives.

✥ Currently total number of authorised non-bank financial institutions (NBFIs) is 34 and the name of the
last NBFI is Alliance Leasing and Finance Company Limited. Bangladesh Bank gives approval (issues
license) to new NBFI as per the Section 4(1) of the Financial Institutions Act—1993.

✥International Recognition of the historic 7th March speech of Bangabandhu by the UNESCO:
The UNESCO on October 30, 2017 recognised the historic 7th March speech of Father of the Nation
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (which effectively declared Bangladesh’s independence) as an
important documentary heritage. The speech has been included in the Memory of the World International
Register (a list of world’s important documentary heritage) maintained by the associate organisation of
the United Nations (UN).

✥ Nobel Economics Prize-2017: American academician Professor Richard Thaler whose research into
behavioural economics showed people do not always make rational financial decisions has been
awarded the 2017 Nobel Economics Prize. He is considered one of the founding fathers of behavioural
economics — a field that shows that far from being the rational decision-makers described in economic
theory, people often make decisions that don't serve their best interests.

✥ Nobel Peace Prize-2017: The Nobel Peace Prize-2017 was awarded to International Campaign to
Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) for its work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian
consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its ground-breaking efforts to achieve a treaty-
based prohibition of such weapons.

— Shyamal Kanti Biswas —