The Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) is set to integrate 14 more services of five public and private organisations into its online one-stop service (OSS) to further facilitate business operations.
The services include visa extension, exporter enrolment, approval of factory machine layout, trade body membership certification, and online bank account opening.
To this effect, the investment promotion agency signed memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with three public and two private organisations at a ceremony on Wednesday.
The service providing organisations are the Department of Immigration and Passport (DIP), Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dhaka (MCCI), City Bank Limited, Directorate of Factory and Establishment Inspection (DIFE), and Export Promotion Bureau (EPB).
BIDA Executive Chairman Md Sirazul Islam presided over the event.
Director General of DIP Major General Mohammad Ayub Chowdhury, President of Foreign Investors' Chamber of Commerce and Industry Rupali Chowdhury, Managing Director and CEO of City Bank Ltd Mashrur Arefin, President of MCCI, Dhaka Barrister Nihad Kabir, DIFE Joint Inspector General Md Mustafizur Rahman, and EPB Vice-Chairman A H M Ahsan joined the signing ceremony, among others.
The BIDA launched its virtual OSS in February 2019 following enactment of the OSS Act 2018. The agency would add four more services to the virtual platform today (Thursday).
Speaking on the occasion, the BIDA executive chairman said with signing of the MoUs and implementation of the service integration soon, investors would easily get more investment-related services.
The BIDA has already signed MoUs with 25 organisations. As a result, a total of 47 services of 15 agencies are now being provided through its OSS.
"Since the launching of OSS, it has been possible to provide more than 25,000 services to investors online."
Mr Sirazul Islam further said despite various ongoing challenges, including the Covid-19 pandemic, the BIDA has brought almost 70 per cent of the targeted services online.
In his speech, Md Mustafizur Rahman said there is no alternative but to provide online services for facilitating businesses and ensuring transparency.
Mr A H M Ahsan said OSS is a key priority for facilitating various services in the country to help businesses grow as well as to achieve the country's development goals.
The EPB would also take measures to make export data available to exporters, businesses and other stakeholders, he added.
[email protected]
