Dhaka, April 19 -- A collapse in industrial or manufacturing output, partly driven by the dollar crunch facing the country for quite some time now, contributed to a significant slowdown in the Bangladesh economy in the second quarter of the current fiscal, with gross domestic product (GDP), or economic, growth having grinded to a pedestrian 3.78 percent.

An analysis of the country's latest macroeconomic data released by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics showed the services sector was also affected in the Q2 (October-Dec) of the current fiscal (2023-24).

Agriculture, once overwhelmingly the largest sector of the economy, proved a saving grace, however. The farm sector gave a better output to the national economy in the period under rev...