Bangladesh has held a total of five bilateral meetings with countries like Japan, Korea, China, India and Singapore to discuss trade facilitation and further increasing bilateral trade and investment opportunities with them.
The meetings took place in the sidelines of the Ministerial Conference (MC13) now taking place in Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (ADNEC), Abu Dhabi in the UAE.
Talking to Bangladesh Post at the conference venue State Minister for Commerce Ahsanul Islam Titu said the bilateral meetings mainly analysed the ongoing export-import situation between Bangladesh and the said countries, while the Bangladesh side expressed its keen interest to further enhancing the trade volume and narrowing the trade gaps between the respective countries.
“We talked about how to diversify the sources of our export,” the Minister said, adding that this time the government is laying the highest emphasis on job creation, and undertaking necessary measures to promote private sector investment and attract FDI. The Minister said some of the countries have made commitments to come forward, especially Korea and Japan have shown their interest to relocate some of their industries in Bangladesh.
“Our government has declared ‘Handicraft’ as the product of the year and undertaken a plan to promote and effectively expand this industry. So, responding to our interest, the Japanese delegation head at MC 13 has expressed desire to come forward to provide necessary support in this regard”, the Minister added.
The Minister mentioned that they have talked to China regarding establishment of import substitute industry and how to facilitate or ease the trade financing. As a country under the European Union (EU), Germany has also shown its interest to cooperate with Bangladesh in moving trade facilitation. They are interested in Leather, Jute and Pharmaceutical industry side by side with RMG.
Replying to a query about the outcome of the meeting with Singapore, the Minister informed that effective discussion had taken place with the country, and Singapore is interested in port modernization and digital documentation so that seamless operations in terms of export and import at the ports become possible.
Titu said Germany will hold a meeting in Delhi immediately, and has invited Bangladesh to participate in it.
He mentioned that most agendas and talking points during the bilateral meeting were regarding signing of Free Trade Agreement (FTA), Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) which will contribute significantly in trade facilitation.