Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) – The BBN has prepared the morning business round up compiling reports, published by different newspapers and news portals in Bangladesh.
Half of cash incentives ends up in apparel exporters’ pocket
Export-oriented apparel units that use local fabrics indirectly eat up around 50 per cent of total cash incentives made available by the government each year, according to a finding that is sceptical about government move for rationalising huge disproportions. This large amount of cash subsidy to the single sector also has emerged as a hurdle to government’s another move: diversifying export basket. The government had provided on average Tk 25 billion to the sector in three fiscal years to 2013-14.
BB governor says bank interest rates to fall further
Bangladesh Bank (BB) Governor Dr. Atiur Rahman has assured business leaders at a meeting on Friday that bank interest rates are already on the downturn and will fall further gradually. Sylhet Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) urged the BB Governor to take effective measures to bring down the interest rates spread to 3.0 per cent from the existing level to spur country’s overall business activities. SCCI President Salah Uddin Ali Ahmed made the appeal at an exchange-of-views meeting with the BB Governor at the chamber office in the country’s south-eastern city on Friday evening.
Garment factories now safer after inspections
Safety in the garment sector has improved over the last two years as factory owners started implementing the corrective actions plans recommended by the engineers of two foreign inspection agencies — Accord and Alliance. “Factories in Bangladesh producing garments for Accord signatory companies have become safer,” said Rob Wayss, Accord’s executive director for Bangladesh operations.
Indo-Bangla commerce secretary-level meeting to begin in Dhaka May 17
A two-day long India-Bangladesh commerce secretary-level meeting will be held in Dhaka from May 17.
To attend the meeting, a high level Indian delegation led by Indian Commerce Secretary Rajeev Kher will visit Bangladesh, said a press statement of the Indian High Commission in Dhaka on Saturday. Bangladesh commerce secretary will head the Dhaka side.
Pak plans anti-dumping duty on B’desh textile chemical
National Tariff Commission of Pakistan has initiated proceedings to impose anti-dumping duty on import of hydrogen peroxide from Bangladesh, commerce ministry officials said. They said that the NTC had already issued a notice of initiation on April 28 and invited the interested parties to attend hearing on the issue. ‘Bangladesh Tariff Commission on behalf of the government and exporters will become parties in the hearing and fight against the allegation of dumping the product as the allegation is not true,’ a senior official of the commerce ministry told New Age on Monday.
Atiur sheds light on BB’s role in inclusive growth
Bangladesh Bank has not confined itself to its sole goal of tackling inflation and is rather addressing risks of instabilities and imbalances through inclusive and environmentally sustainable institutional ethos in financing, its governor said. Atiur Rahman said BB has deliberately shunned the minimalist orthodoxy of inflation targeting as the sole legitimate objective of the central banking. “Last decade’s global financial crisis has proven this minimalist orthodoxy deficient even for developed economies, but the unconventional approaches of developed economy central banks still go no further than monetary loosening by quantitative easing, in effect sowing seeds of further imbalances, future instabilities and crises.”
Plea to tap more internal resources to attain SDGs
Speakers at a meeting in Dhaka suggested Saturday that the poor and developing countries should mobilise more internal resources instead of depending on external assistance to attain Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). They also called for tapping local and foreign investments, inter- and intra-regional trades and boosting internal revenue income to bankroll the SDGs, a new global development paradigm in post-2015 period. The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), the ENDPOVERTY 2015 millennium campaign, and the Southern Voice on Post-MDG International Development Goals jointly organised a two-day expert group meeting on ‘Asian Partnership in Financing SDGs’, starting in Dhaka Saturday.
Bangladesh invited for May 29 meeting on human trafficking in Thailand
Bangladesh has been invited to join a regional meeting on human trafficking and people smuggling issues which is scheduled to begin in Thailand on May 29. The meeting was called in the backdrop of the recent reports that thousands of people from Bangladesh and Myanmar are stranded on smugglers’ boats between the Andaman Sea and the Straits of Malacca. The special meeting will discuss the speedy increasing exodus of migrants through the Bay of Bengal and the people drifting in boats without food and drinking water in Malacca Strait and the coasts of the South East Asian countries.