B\'desh, Mexico meet in May to tap business potentials

Diplomats of Bangladesh and Mexico will sit in the city on May 7 to hold the first foreign office consultation, aiming to strengthen bilateral relations and tap the potentials in trade and business.
Officials said the two countries had insignificant trade and investment cooperation, but have common areas of interest in the United Nations and different multilateral forums.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials said that such a consultation has been arranged in line with the memorandum of understanding signed between the two countries in 2015.
"The consultation meeting will try to find areas of cooperation for improving diplomatic relations with the Latin American country," said an official preferring not to be named.
The Foreign Office has already identified some areas of cooperation such as technology, livestock, and agriculture but officials said the director-general level consultation would finalise the areas during the day-long meeting.
Ambassadors of both countries will be present.
Bangladesh exports leather, jute, garment products and chemical products to Mexico while imports cotton, organic chemical, sugar machinery, boiler machinery and mechanical appliances, according to Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The state-run Bangladesh Tariff Commission data showed the two-way trade between Bangladesh and Mexico rose to $96 million in fiscal year 2010-11 from $80 million the  year before.
Sources, however, said the trade volume of the two countries would not be more than US $200 million.
The diplomatic relations with Mexico was established four years after the country's independence in 1971.
But officials said the bilateral economic relationship had not developed much until 2013.
The government has taken steps to improve diplomatic and economic relations with Latin America.
A foreign ministry delegation also visited different Latin American countries in 2014 to find business potentials in countries like Brazil, Argentina, Panama and Mexico.
Since then, the ministry has started establishing resident missions in Latin American countries to diversify the country's exports markets beyond North America and Europe.
The Foreign Office has so far held consultations with Brazil and signed an MoU.
Currently, Bangladesh has its mission in Mexico City, but the Latin American nation maintains an honorary consulate in Dhaka.
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