Dhaka, July 16 – In a bid to diversify the export basket, the government is planning incentives for other export oriented sectors like ready-made garments (RMG), Salman F Rahman, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Private Industry and Investment Advisor said yesterday.“We however have to be careful that by over-emphasizing on export diversification, we must not shift our focus from the RMG. That is still our main product,” he said while speaking as the chief guest at a workshop in the city.
Economic Reporters’ Forum (ERF) arranged the workshop titled “Orientation of the members of the Economic Reporters Forum on Export Diversification for Economic Growth in Bangladesh” at its Paltan office
Salman said in the last couple of years, there has been a diversification in the RMG products. “We now produce different types of high end RMG products,” he said adding that the markets for RMG is also become diversified.
“Previously we only used to export in the US and the European market, now we export into many other markets as well,” he added.
He however said the inexperience of the Bangladeshi entrepreneurs get exposed when they get out of their comfort zone.
“We have achieved expertise in the RMG sectors; have achieved expertise in leather as well as in pharmaceutical sectors but we can’t say the same for many other sectors. So when we try to do something there, our inexperience becomes evident. If it doesn’t get exposed at the labor level, it gets exposed at managerial level, and that is why we hire so many managers from outside” He said.
Emphasizing on the need of creating the next generation entrepreneurs, he said Bangladesh has a large young generation and time is ripe now to reap the benefit of the demographic dividend.
He informed that the government has completed selecting trainers for the budding entrepreneurs. “In all 64 districts of the country, new entrepreneurs will be trained by these skilled groups of trainers.”
Salman said the new young entrepreneurs will live by the slogan “we don’t want jobs, we will give jobs.”
He also informed that Bangladesh’s global position in doing business ranking is likely to come down to below 100 from the existing 176 by 2021 as the government has taken various reform initiatives to improve the country’s business environment.
“Bangladesh is very business friendly country. We are taking different reform initiatives to improve the business environment. If we can implement all the initiatives, it will help not only bring down our ranking in below 100 by 2021 but also below 50 within the next five years,” said Salman.
ERF President Saiful Islam and ERF General Secretary SM Rashidul Islam also spoke on occasion. – Staff Reporter
