Garment industry now open to FDI outside EPZs

The government has finally agreed to conditionally allow foreign direct investment (FDI) in the garment industry outside the export-processing zones (EPZs) for boosting apparel exports.    Officials and sector-insiders said the agreement came at a recent meeting of the government with...

Banks\\\' Q3 financials indicate a turnaround

The profit earned by a number of listed banks was higher in the third quarter (July-September) of the current calendar year compared to that fetched during the corresponding period of last year.   Bankers attribute the positive development to political stability...

High cost of raw materials, absence of testing facilities impede drug exports

High cost of raw materials and absence of required testing facilities are holding back the growth of pharmaceutical exports from Bangladesh, industry insiders and experts have said. According to them, the locally produced drugs are facing tough competition in the...

Bancassurance: A state-of-the-art insurance distribution channel

Bancassurance is an alternative distribution channel for insurance products where a strategic business relationship is formed between a bank and an insurance company with a view to making use of the bank's sales channels as well as customer bases for...

China upholds its own model of socialism

Before 1949 China was ruled by land lords and bourgeoisie in collusion with imperialist powers. The semi-colonial and semi-feudal system was the root of exploitation and people's suffering in Chinese society.  After a long struggle and sacrifices, the Chinese people...

Combating marine pollution brooks no delay

Bangladesh ratified the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) 1982 more than 13 years ago on July 27, 2001. It was a landmark legal step for the settlement of maritime boundary disputes with Myanmar and India. Pursuant...

AIIB could plug Dhaka\\\'s long-term financing gap, says ESCAP official

The new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is expected to meet the long-term financial needs of small economies like Bangladesh, helping them to improve infrastructure, a United Nations official said. "To address the major challenge of financial shortage in developing...

Jordan\\\'s Arab Bank appeals against Hamas finance ruling

Jordanian lender Arab Bank Group said its had begun legal steps to appeal a U.S. jury ruling which found it liable for financing Islamic militant group Hamas. The U.S. civil lawsuit brought against the Jordan-based bank has been described by...

China\\\'s auto market growth may halve to 7.0pc this year

Growth in China's auto market, the world's biggest, will halve to 7.0 per cent this year weighed down by a slowing economy, the head of an industry body said cost week. "Personally, I think growth this year can reach 7.0...

ECB fails 25 banks in health check but problems largely solved

Roughly one in five of the euro zone's top lenders failed landmark health checks at the end of last year but most have since repaired their finances, the European Central Bank said on Sunday. Painting a brighter picture than had...

Stocks return to green amid sluggish turnover

Stocks returned to the green Monday after three sessions’ fall with turnover remained sluggish as the investors went for late hour buying spree. The market opened with a negative mood, but late hours buying binge sent the market in green...

DSE, CSE see downturn

Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) and Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) witnessed negative trend in early hours of trading on Monday, maintaining the previous day’s downturn. DSEX, the prime index of the DSE went down by 12.34 points or 0.24 per cent...

Emerging fiscal crimes daunting challenge for law enforcement

Various financial crimes, including some shocking scams, have recently emerged as one of the most challenging tasks in law enforcement amid a breakdown of social and moral values, opine experts.       Criminologists and law-enforcers observe that organised gangs of criminals are...

World beset with grave crises

When we get up in the morning and listen to the radio or television or read the newspaper, we are confronted with the same depressing news and horrible stories: violence, crime, wars, and disasters. Not a single day passes without...

Plastic money: Bangladesh perspective

In most of the developed countries, plastic money has replaced the paper currency on a large scale and is now being adopted in developing countries gradually. Plastic money basically consists of different cards, both debit and credit, used as a...

When protectors turn predators

Protectors have become predators in all ages. But in recent times, the predatoriness has evidently surpassed all past records. In a modern state, the weak are protected from the clutches of the aggressors by its set organs and agencies where...

The shootings in Ottawa and the US media

The media in the United States goes over the edge every time an act of terror occurs anywhere in any western country, particularly in its soil that has any assumed (which is the case almost all the time) or real...

Iraqi security forces, Kurds, gain ground against Islamic State

Iraqi security forces made significant gains against Islamic State in a strategic area near Baghdad last week and Kurdish fighters retook a northern town after heavy coalition air strikes against the Sunni Islamist insurgents. Iraqi troops seized most of Jurf...

China central bank seen playing safe as slowdown fans policy debate

China's central bank is likely to hold its line against an interest rate cut even as growth slows to a quarter-century trough, as the politics of reform influences the conduct of monetary policy, government sources involved in internal policy discussions...

Fears for tough penalties grow as India cleans up business

An unprecedented ban on India's largest property developer from tapping capital markets has fuelled expectations of tougher penalties ahead, as the country's regulators feel emboldened to take on even companies long sheltered by political connections. The result has been a...

France does the splits on EU economic governance

France has long called for a European economic government to harmonise the bloc's policies, but it is baulking now at that governance being applied to its own fiscal indiscipline. After defying European Union rules by putting forward a budget far...

US govt probes medical devices for possible cyber flaws

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is investigating about two dozen cases of suspected cybersecurity flaws in medical devices and hospital equipment that officials fear could be exploited by hackers, a senior official at the agency told Reuters. The...

Stocks slip into red amid sluggish turnover

Stocks ended lower for the third running session on Sunday with turnover remained sluggish as the investors went for selling spree amid countrywide hartal. DSEX, the prime index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) ended at 5,111.63 points, shedding 42.46...

Half of motor vehicles operate without fitness certificates

Nearly half a million motorised vehicles are running throughout the country without any fitness, according to BRTA statistics. Almost fifty per cent of these vehicles are running in and around the capital city. The data available with Bangladesh Road Transport...

Grabbing city\\\'s open spaces

A private company engaged in construction of Moghbazar-Mouchak flyover has now occupied a sizeable portion of BG Press Colony playground in city's Tejgaonarea to store heavy equipment including bulldozers and cranes for the purpose. In order to take possession of...

10,000 people trafficked thru\\\' Cox\\\'s Bazar coast to Malaysia, Thailand per month

More than 10,000 people are trafficked through Cox's Bazar coastal area to Malaysia and Thailand per month as a number of organised gangs of human traffickers are engaged in the crime, officials said. The Detective Branch (DB) of Police has...

Prohibitive prices keep tanners from buying rawhides in bigger way

Stunned by seasonal market melee, tanners have not yet begun buying in a bigger way the rawhides of sacrificial animals even 18 days after the Eid-ul-Azha fiesta because of increased prices traders said. Though traders have purchased the rawhides and...

Patronising electrical goods manufacturers

Almost 50 per cent of the population of the erstwhile Bengal used to be artisans and small and mid-level business people. A lot of people in this region were involved in local industries like textiles, metal work, pottery etc. Things...

The theory and reality of market economy

Economics can turn out to be a dangerous profession or principle for those who put unrestrained and strong faith in the conventional foundation of economics with which they embark upon in the world of economics. In fact, it can be...

Matching endowments and opportunities

Bangladesh is widely known as a country of microfinance institutions (MFIs) where thousands of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are spread over the country to provide various services, including microcredit, to the poor. The microfinance model of Bangladesh has been adapted in...