Dhaka, March 11 -- The flow of formal credit to the private sector has experienced a significant decline over the past six months, reaching its lowest growth rate in a decade at just 7.15 per cent in January this year.

This downturn is attributed to high interest rates, reduced lending capacity among banks, and a contraction in import trade.

The central bank has been tracking private sector credit growth since January 2015, and the latest figures indicate that such a low growth rate has not been recorded in the past ten years.

The growth rate for January fell short of the central bank's target of 9.80 per cent for the second half of the current fiscal year 2024-25 by 2.65 per centage points.

For context, the growth rates were 7.28 per...