Global Midas, a development partner with the support of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), has offered Bangladesh nearly Taka one lakh crore loan in order to speed up the ongoing infrastructure development projects.

The global organisation has showed keen interest to give low interest loan on special economic zones, railway, metro rail, airport, green field project, construction of power plant and IT Park.

It has already sent a letter to the Economic Relations Division in this regard.

Regarding the letter, Shahriar Quader Siddiqui, head (joint secretary) of the Asian wing of the economic relations department, said Global Midas wants to lend a large amount of loans to various projects in Bangladesh.

They have given a letter in this regard, he said adding that, it has been sent to the relevant desk for review.

In a letter to ERD, Global Midas said it was offering loans for major projects including special economic zones, power plants and IT parks.

 In addition to various types of loans, Global Midas has also invested in bonds in the public and private sectors.

The company has also expressed interest in a public-private partnership (PPP) project.

Planning ministry officials said hundreds of projects are in financial crisis.

The projects are being kept alive with nominal money, they said adding that, the revenue deficit has created a financial crisis in the government's development projects.

In this case, the big loan offer of Global Midas can be considered seriously, they added.

Failure to take such loans will make it difficult to achieve the GDP growth target, they mentioned.

On the other hand, officials of Bangladesh Bank said the government is taking huge amount of loans from the banking system every day.

 If the government takes a loan in this way, the ordinary customer will not get a loan properly, they mentioned.

Considering these aspects, low interest loans can be taken from international organizations like Global Midas, they added.

According to ERD sources, the grace period of the loan proposed by Global Midas is one to two years.

The entire loan has to be repaid within 25 years.

A maximum of less than two percent interest has to be paid against this loan, which is lower than a few other institutions, including the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC).

Sheikh Sarwar, head of Global Midas Bangladesh, said Midas is interested in lending more than the budget deficit of Bangladesh.

It has already informed the matter to ERD, he said adding that, Global Midas has given large loans to several countries including Nepal, Singapore and India.

“Now we are interested in giving low interest loans in Bangladesh. Interest rates on loans will be limited to one to two percent,” he mentioned.