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Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has called upon Japanese businessmen to work together with Bangladesh for “peace, progress and prosperity” of both the countries. |
Speaking to a group of businessmen who are travelling with her Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, Hasina urged the businessmen to fulfil the aspirations of the two countries.
Abe arrived in Dhaka on Saturday at around 1pm on a less than 22 hour tour, first by a Japanese prime minister in 14 years.
A large business delegation including top executives of Japanese infrastructure, finance, garment, medical, food and safe water companies is visiting with him.
Hasina delivered a short speech for them mostly encouraging them to invest in
Bangladesh.
She called Abe “visionary” prime minister and told the business delegation that they had decided to carry forward the ‘comprehensive partnership’ they had agreed in May during her Tokyo visit.
“The private sector is likely to play a key role” in this comprehensive partnership, she said, aiming at “encompassing wide-ranging economic co-operation among other things”.
She thanked them for considering Bangladesh as their “next possible destination for extensive investment and business”.
Japan is looking for investment opportunities outside China as part of its ‘China+1’ policy.
The prime minister highlighted why they should pick
Bangladesh in this regard.
She said Bangladesh stands amongst the first 44 economies in the world, both in terms of size of GDP and foreign currency reserve, within the framework of a market economy.
“With about 160mn people and a rapidly growing middle class, there is an increasing domestic demand for consumer goods and services.”
She said Bangladesh offers “a young, industrious workforce with comparatively lower
wages”.
“It has proven export competitiveness by offering most competitive fiscal and non-fiscal investment incentives and the most liberal FDI regime in
South Asia.
“Foreign investment in Bangladesh is secured by law,” she also told them, “which also ensures no discrimination between local and foreign investors.”
“We encourage private sector investors from Japan to visit Bangladesh and be acquainted with the investment
opportunities here,” Hasina said.
She said Bangladesh was also working towards the establishment of an Exclusive Economic Zone only for Japanese investors.
“We have investment potentials in the sectors like textiles, leather, petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, shipbuilding, agro-based industries, light engineering and electronics, telecommunications and IT.”
She specifically expected that Japanese investment would come in high-tech manufacturing sectors like automobiles and microprocessors.
“We have also adopted public private partnership (PPP) policy for building infrastructure projects,” she said, adding that Japanese industrialists should come forward “to take full advantage” of Bangladesh’s
investment opportunities.
She also referred to the August 21 joint Bangladesh-Japan public private economic dialogue in Dhaka that suggested steps to facilitate Japanese investment in Bangladesh.
