PM woos US businesses to invest in Bangladesh

NEW YORK, Sept 26: Giving her assurance that doing business with Bangladesh will be a much more attractive choice, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has urged all US business friends to come to Bangladesh to enhance cooperation for materialising the twin purposes of 'shared interests' and 'mutual benefits'.
"I invite all our friends to come to Bangladesh. I can assure you that doing business with Bangladesh would be a much attractive choice for you," she said.
The Prime Minister was addressing a luncheon meeting with the US Business Council for International Understanding (BCIU) at Hotel Waldorf Astoria in New York on Friday.
"Our two peoples share the same set of values and ethos: freedom, democracy, human rights, inclusion, equality, pluralism, secularism. Though we're at diverse levels of development and endowment, we celebrate diversity, espouse tolerance and support women’s empowerment," she added.
The Prime Minister further said, "We believe in right-based societies. Free media and enterprise are our hallmarks. We share common stance on addressing terrorism and countering violent extremism across societies. For Bangladesh, all these ideals formed the core of our State fundamentals; and these continue to guide actions of our people, our State."
Sheikh Hasina said her government was revisiting its investment regime to simplify processes - to ensure higher return from investments in Bangladesh. "We're focusing on planned and responsible industrialisation. For that, we've rolled in 18 Special Economic Zones (SEZs)."
In this connection, she called upon the US businesses to consider sectors like road, power, energy, tourism and hospitality, waste management and water supply. "You should also find entire food and agriculture sector attractive."
In Bangladesh, Hasina said pharmaceutical sector is such a sector where local production now meets 97 per cent of the country's domestic medicine requirements while its pharma products are exported to 83 countries.
She said shipbuilding is the latest tag line from Bangladesh as the country's builders have rapidly caught global attention -- by making world class, light to medium size vessels. These ply the Atlantic, seas across Europe, New Zealand and such. They now command 1.0 per cent share of the 200 billion dollars global market.
On knowledge industries, ICT and related industry is expanding rapidly. Gartner has billed Bangladesh as one of the top 30 global destinations for software and IT services. Thousands of applications made in Bangladesh are running on IPhones, Samsung Galaxy, other Android and Blackberry phones. Last year, Bangladeshi IT companies earned over US$260 million.
The Prime Minister said many of Bangladesh's friends in the West estimate that return on investments in Bangladesh is a few times higher than in their own countries.
The Prime Minister said the Bay of Bengal offers a vast array of resources and services to exploit as her government has successfully settled maritime border disputes with Myanmar and India. These pave ways for “your deeper engagement.”
"Our offshore is now open for Blue Ocean marine resources exploration. Recently, we've appointed two major US companies through competitive processes for this purpose," she said.
Heads and CEOs of as many as 27 large companies of the US, including president and CEO of BCIU Peter J. Tichansky, president and CEO of Skypower Global Kerry Adler, vice president of American Power Corporation Sanjay Agarwal, CEO of Zephyr Management Thomas Barry, executive vice president of Mastercard International Edward Brandt and Chief Development Officer of Accelerate Energy Daniel Bustos joined the roundtable.
Finance Minister AMA Muhith, Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali, PM's adviser on ICT Affairs Sajeeb Wajed Joy, Expatriates' Welfare Minister Nurul Islam, LGRD and Cooperatives Minster Engineer Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain, PM's Advisers Dr. Moshiur Rahman and Dr Gowher Rizvi, State Minister for Foreign Affairs M Shariar Alam, Bangladesh Ambassador to USA M Ziauddin, Bangladesh's Permanent Representative to the UN Dr Abdul Momen and President of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry Abdul Matlub Ahmad were, among others, present.—UNB
Ends/AR/Sept 26, 2015