The country still has sufficient foreign currency reserves. According to the Prime Minister, the country has about USD 200 M more than the minimum requirement. Prime Minister Dr Lotay Tshering said this today while talking to the media during an online press conference.
The Prime Minister says the country currently has more than USD 850 M in foreign reserves. This is against the minimum foreign reserves of USD 668 M required to meet the country’s import of essentials for a year.
He added that although the foreign reserves are still depleting, the rate at which it is going down has slowed.
“I’m not saying we’re very comfortable, but we are monitoring it daily. Should it be of any alarm, we have a list that will go out and we will put some extra moratoriums on imports,” said Lyonchhen.
With all the covid restrictions fully relaxed, he said the country’s economy is also picking up.
The Prime Minister said there are three ways to refill the foreign reserves-through international borrowings, international grants and trade.
“We are informing the Multi-financial institutions if they can go beyond what Bhutan is eligible to. We have already started the dialogues. The second way to have dollars in the RMA account is through grants. What we are eligible for and what we are getting is all on their way. But we can’t get anything extra, the whole world is facing a shortage of money. And the third one is through trading. Trading is also picking up, and tourism is also on the positive side,” Lyonchhen added.
The Prime Minister, during his tour to the eastern parts of the country in July, had said that the country’s foreign currency reserves had depleted to around USD 850 M from about USD 1.3bn two years ago. He had stated that this would last only about 15 months if the country’s economic situation did not improve.
The government suspended the import of vehicles on August 19 to protect the country’s depleting foreign reserves.
Samten Dolkar
Edited by Yeshi Gyaltshen
