DHAKA, May 23: Bang-ladesh’s economy is forecast to have grown at 6.32 per cent in the fiscal year to June, a slowdown from last year's expansion, dragged by a “saturated” farm sector, officials said on Wednesday.

The government had projected seven per cent growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the 2011-12 financial year, but a meagre two per cent expansion in the key agriculture sector means the growth has fallen short of expectations.

“The Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) has estimated that the economy will grow at 6.32 per cent in the current financial year,” the government's statistics secretary Riti Ibrahim told AFP.

The BBS revised its figures for 2010-11 growth upwards to 6.71 per cent from a provisional estimate of 6.66 per cent.

Ibrahim said industries remained the main driver of growth, expanding by around 10pc while services sector, the largest component in the impoverished economy, grew at six per cent.

“But growth in the farm sector has slowed down to around two per cent. The sector is saturated. Farm productivity has reached an optimum level as we are losing huge areas of farmland every year due to growing population,” she said.—AFP