Despite widespread international opposition, trade officials from the 12 countries negotiating the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) in Atlanta, USA announced on 5 October that they have reached an agreement on a devastating trade deal that threatens people and the planet.…
Mobile-phone users in Bangladesh will have to wait until next year to avail the facility to switch operators without changing their numbers.State Minister for Posts and Telecommunications Tarana Halim says it might take February or March next year to introduce…
Chinese Ambassador Ma Mingqiang has advised Bangladesh to promote itself in Beijing to woo investors. “Many Chinese people don’t have deep understanding about Bangladesh,” he said. “They consider Bangladesh a very close neighbour, but they don’t have understanding about the…
Bangladesh has appealed to India to withdraw the recent administrative notice imposing barrier on import of jute and jute products from Bangladesh, which is adversely affecting the former’s economy. Bangladesh Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed raised the concern at a meeting…
Mobile-phone operators Robi and Airtel have sought permission from telecoms regulators BTRC for a merger that could create Bangladesh’s second biggest wireless carrier behind Norwegian giant Telenor’s Grameenphone. In a letter, the operators said Malaysia’s Axiata Group and NTT DoCoMo…
BNP yesterday alleged that the ruling party cadres occupied cattle markets in the city and they are realising tolls whimsically at rates higher than in the past. “The cattle markets in the city were leased to leaders of the ruling…
BNP on Saturday alleged that the government, sidetracking the National Board of Revenue (NBR), has unilaterally reduced the customs fee to Tk 580 from Tk 1,000 for transit or transhipment of each tonne of Indian goods through Bangladesh. Addressing a…
Tannery owners, worried about preserving raw hides made available during Eid-ul-Azha sacrifice due to hot weather, also fear a sharp drop due to Indian restrictions on cow smuggling. Hides of animals sacrificed during Eid meet nearly half of Bangladesh’s annual…
Norway’s telecoms regulator will impose tighter regulations of the price top operator Telenor is allowed to charge other companies for using its mobile phone network, the Norwegian Communications Authority (NKOM) said on Thursday. Telenor has a market share of just…
Oil prices fell more than 2 percent on Friday after Goldman Sachs cut its crude forecasts, citing global oversupply and concerns over the Chinese economy, and after Saudi Arabia dismissed the idea of an oil producer summit. Joining a long…
India’s move to plug cattle smuggling will not have much impact on Chittagong market during the Eid-ul-Azha, when the demand for sacrificial animals runs high, local cattle traders and government officials say. They maintain that the local demand for animals…
Mentioning that export growth has reduced by 11.96 percent in the first two months of the current fiscal year, the Exporters Association of Bangladesh (EAB) on Saturday observed that the recent increase in gas and electricity prices will again put…
Oil prices fell more than 4 percent to fresh 6-1/2-year lows on Monday after Chinese stock markets suffered their biggest one-day drop since the global financial crisis, intensifying worries over the outlook for global oil demand.Inaction by the Chinese government following an…
US oil prices headed for their eighth consecutive week of falls on Friday, the longest losing streak since 1986, after a sharp drop in Chinese manufacturing increased worries over the health of the world’s biggest energy consumer. Activity in China’s…
The government has yet again backed down on the December deadline for tannery industries in Hazaribagh to relocate to Savar’s under-construction Leather Industrial City.A taskforce comprising six ministers decided at a meeting on Wednesday to give them more time.
Meghalaya Chief Minister Mukul Sangma on Saturday said the land agreement that was signed between India and Bangladesh would give a fillip to trade, commerce and tourism between the two countries. Sangma spoke here at the main Independence Day celebration…
Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed sees politics behind the US decision to deny Bangladesh products GSP, but US Ambassador in Dhaka Marcia Bernicat disagrees.After visiting a few readymade garment factories in Gazipur on Tuesday, Bernicat told reporters that ‘there was no…
US Ambassador in Dhaka Marcia Stephens Bloom Bernicat on Wednesday said the US will restore Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) for Bangladesh if it fully implements specific measures listed in the GSP Action Plan for it. She made the remark…
As indicated earlier in January this year’s review, Bangladesh has been excluded in the renewal of Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). On June 29, 2015, President Barack Obama signed into law a bill (H.R. 1295), that reauthorises the GSP through…
The United States has renewed its Generalised System of Preference (GSP) facility for 122 countries, but Bangladesh is not one of them.The office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) website says the facility is still suspended for Bangladesh and that…
The US will continue to engage with Bangladesh to strengthen the readymade garment (RMG) sector of Bangladesh by ensuring workers’ right and safety, according to American Ambassador Marcia Bernicat. “Together with you (BGMEA), the other international partners and the brands,…
Taiwan’s Foxconn, the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer and a key supplier to Apple Inc, on Saturday signed a pact with India’s Maharashtra state to invest $5 billion over five years on a new electronics manufacturing facility.
Prices of vegetables have shot up in Chittagong due to the impact of cyclone ‘Komen’.Prices of fish and meat were however stable on Friday.
The prices of onion have skyrocketed by Tk 20 a kilogram in capital Dhaka.Businessmen blamed the abrupt hike on a spike in prices on low supply in India.
Asian shares were mostly higher on Wednesday on hopes that Beijing could stem the rout in its markets without damage to the economy, though caution was the watchword ahead of a policy decision from the US Federal Reserve. The CSI300…
The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Division’s Additional Secretary Golam Fakhruddin Ahmed Chowdhury has been appointed Managing Director of Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited (BTCL). Public administration ministry issued a circular to this effect on Tuesday.Previously, he served in the Office…
The Bangladesh Bank aims to distribute Tk 164 billion as agriculture and rural credit in 2015-16 fiscal year (FY). Governor Atiur Rahman disclosed the plan on Monday while announcing the bank’s agriculture and rural credit policy.The target had been set…
The next managing director of the International Monetary Fund is likely to come from outside Europe when current leader Christine Lagarde eventually leaves, the deputy head of the Washington-based fund said in an interview broadcast on Saturday.
The price of onions, a staple that has sparked protests in the past and toppled state governments, has jumped to its highest in nearly two years and could fuel food inflation as scant rain delays plantings.Persistently high food prices, mainly…
By Nile Bowie Often touted as the centerpiece of the Obama administration’s re-engagement with Asia, a close vote in the US Senate has brought the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) a major step closer to becoming law. Facing significant opposition within his…