Abstract:A very important issue that plays a crucial role in development of the economies is the underutilization of its human capital i.e. unemployment. This paper investigates macroeconomic determinants of unemployment rate in Bangladesh economy for the period of 2000-2011 using Simple Single Equation Linear Regression Model (SELRM). The variables selected for the study are Unemployment rate, GDP growth rate, Exchange rate and Inflation rate (CPI based). The results of regression analysis showed significant impact of all the variables. Our main finding includes that Inflation rate stimulate unemployment positively and GDP growth rate and Exchange rate has negative impact on unemployment. Keywords: Unemployment rate, GDP growth rate, Exchange rate, Inflation rate. Introduction:Unemployment is one of the major problems in almost all the countries of the world. It has been the most consistent problem which is facing by all industrially advanced as well as poor countries. Unemployment is defined as the condition of having no job or being out of work or proportion of people which are able to work and actively searching jobs but they are unable to find it. Some of the very common causes of unemployment in Bangladesh and other developing economies are the technological changes, contribution of women in labor force, demographic structure, economic conditions, production of electricity (especially in Bangladesh), immigration from rural area's towards towns and cities. A decrease in the growth of the economies because of the economic recession of October 2008 is a major reason of increasing rate of unemployment for both developed and developing countries. According to theory, there is a positive relation between employment and the economic growth of countries. Economic growth is a vital factor that affects the unemployment. Theoretically a positive relation should exist among growth and employment or negative with unemployment. The economic theory, which converse on the subject of the relationship between unemployment and the economic growth is named as Okun's law. He studied the trade off among the real GNP and the unemployment. According to the theory there is an inverse relation between growth and the unemployment. The relationship between unemployment and the inflation is termed as Philips curve in the economic theory and was developed in 1958 by A. W. H. Philip. He discovered positive relationship between the two variables. Individually, inflation and unemployment both have negative effects on the individuals. With the globalization and open trades, exchange rate has started playing a vital role in the economy which has a direct effect on the unemployment level in a country. With devaluation, exports tend to boost and as a result expenditure on imports are reduced. By this, inflow of foreign currency is enhanced economies move towards growth and consequently the rate of unemployment declines. Objectives of this study:In Bangladesh GDP growth rate, exchange rate and inflation rate are the most important economic var...

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are an essential part of Bangladesh's economy, contributing significantly to the country's gross domestic product (GDP). The study aims to investigate the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the owners of SMEs in Bangladesh. To serve this purpose, cross-sectional data were collected from 103 participants using a purposive sampling technique. We generated different frequency distribution tables based on our inputted data, and then the results of the study were presented using descriptive statistics. The results of the study showed that 58.3% of the SMEs were completely shut down due to COVID-19 pandemic. We also observed that the demand for goods reduced by 83.5%, while production costs increased by 21.4%. Thus, the overall production of goods in SMEs decreased by 48.5%. Most of the owners (90.3%) stated that their profit was dropped by 50% to 100% during corona pandemic, and 68.9% of owners had to retrench workers from their organizations to reduce costs. Approximately, 78.3% of respondents stated that their products remained unsold from 10% to 70% during the pandemic. The findings suggest that policymakers should advance the SME sector by incorporating e-commerce, more favorable government policies, facilitating bank loans, and establishing new training institutions to solve the existing drawbacks of this sector.

The study aimed at establishing the effect of hormone and ripening agent on mass transfer as well as to find the effect of solution type and fruit to solution ratio for mass transfer of pineapple. Two types of pineapple, organic pineapple and GRM pineapple (pineapple cultivated with growth regulator and medicine) were collected and sliced into 8mm thickness. The slices were immersed in 60% sugar, 55/5% sugar-salt mixture solution for different periods of time at three different fruit to solution ratio (1:6, 1:8 and 1:10) and mass transfer coefficient were determined from the data. Results indicated that for organic pineapple mass transfer coefficient was higher than GRM pineapple (0.1583/min1/2 vs. 0.1502/min1/2). Again, for 55/5% sugar-salt mixture solution, mass transfer coefficient was higher than 60% sugar solution. Maximum rate of mass transfer (0.2281/min1/2) was determined at 1:6 fruit to solution ratio and minimum (0.1504/min1/2) was at 1:10 fruit to solution ratio for GRM pineapple.