Australia has expressed the interest to develop its manufacturing hub in Bangladesh to buy back the goods to be produced here or export to the European and other rich countries, according to officials.
To implement the plan, Australian trade officials stressed on organising interactions between the traders and industrialists of the two countries.
Under the plan, Australian businesses will provide inputs like wool, cotton, timber, meat, hides and grains to Bangladeshi industrialists who will produce goods here and re-export to Australia or European countries.
These were discussed at the first joint working group meeting under the Trade and Investment Framework Arrangement (TIFA), held late last month, in Canberra.
The meeting decided that Australia and Bangladesh will facilitate industry connections between Australian exporters of agricultural raw materials and Bangladeshi importers and manufacturers.
It also decided that Australia and Bangladesh will jointly identify the opportunities for Australian producers and Bangladeshi manufacturers to engage with global value chains, like developing industry connections in third country markets or encourage Australian businesses to buy back finished goods to be produced from Australian inputs.
Canberra agreed to continue to connect Bangladeshi and Australian business chambers through its High Commission in Dhaka for encouraging commercial relationships between the businesses.
The meeting decided that Australia and Bangladesh will work to engage relevant private sector areas in further work under TIFA and encourage institutional linkages between the apex trade bodies.
Following the meeting, the Bangladesh High Commission in Canberra in a recent letter to the ministry of commerce suggested making arrangements for visits of interested Bangladeshi industrialists to Australia.
Trade officials in Dhaka said Canberra has pledged continuation of duty-free and quota-free (DFQF) market access of Bangladeshi products to the Australian market even after Bangladesh's leaving the poor countries' club in 2026.
"It's a big news for our trade in the post-LDC era," said Hafizur Rahman, an additional secretary of the ministry of commerce, who attended the meeting.
Continuation of the DFQF facility in Australia will come as a huge support when many of the trade preferences will be withdrawn from many markets, he added.
Bangladeshi products enter the country without paying duties under the Australian System of Trade Preferences (ASTP) that offers duty-free facility for goods from all least developed countries (LDCs).
Trade between the two countries now hovers around US$1.5 billion. In fiscal year 2019-20, Bangladesh exported goods worth $762.9 million to Australia while imports from there valued at $695.7 million.
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