BD, EU meet Nov 27 to review economic ties

Syful Islam Officials of Bangladesh and the European Union (EU) will sit together later this month to review their trade, investment and economic relations, officials said. Such a review takes place once in two years aiming to identify the problems and further boost the relations, a senior Ministry of Commerce (MoC) official told the FE. The MoC recently convened a meeting, with Commerce Secretary M Ghulam Hossain in the chair, to take preparation for the talks with the EU. The meeting mainly discussed Bangladesh's policy options to deal with the situation emerging out of India's changed position relating to the EU's offer of tariff concessions to Pakistan. "Our talks with the EU on November 27 will mainly focus on EU's tariff concessions to Pakistan as eight Bangladeshi apparel items may be hit hard following the decision," the official said without elaborating. Sources said issues like EU-Bangladesh trade relations, multilateral trade negotiations like Doha development agenda, EU's new rules of origin and the GSP (generalised system of preferences), export restrictions will be discussed during the meeting. The meeting will discuss shipping services and postal act, intellectual property rights, sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) and fisheries export, illegal, uninterrupted and unregulated fishing, and the EU-Bangladesh Aviation Agreement. The meeting will also discuss EU's business activity in Bangladesh, business environment like energy policy, and transport policy. Recent developments and longer-term trends in the EU and Bangladesh economies are also on the agenda of the talks, the sources said. The EU is the largest destination of Bangladeshi exports. The main items Bangladesh exports to the EU are readymade garments, frozen food, leather, jute and tea. Most of the Bangladeshi goods enjoy zero-duty facility to the EU market under its 'Everything But Arms' scheme. The export to the EU reached US$ 9.0 billion last year and the EU officials hope that it will rise significantly by the end of this year. Head of Delegation of the European Union to Bangladesh Ambassador William Hanna recently said that EU's first major investment in Bangladesh was Sterling tea gardens in the Sylhet region. Foreign direct investment from the EU has come to the pharmaceutical, chemical, cement, electric appliances and other sectors recently. There are more than 300 companies of EU origin now operating in Bangladesh.