Bangladesh High Commissioner to India Syed Muazzem Ali on Friday urged the Indian investors to launch joint venture (JV) projects in Bangladesh for mutual benefits of the two close neighbours.
"Bangladesh has a huge skilled and semi-skilled young workforce, and the country offers attractive incentives for the development of joint venture projects.... on a "buy back" basis," the High Commissioner said, Bangladesh High Commission in India said in a statement.
His comments came at the inauguration of the Silver Jubilee of the International Guwahati Trade Fair in Guwahati, Assam.
He said the Indian investors should take the advantage of "our cheaper labour costs and closer proximity to North-East markets" to set up industries in Bangladesh and export the products to India.
North-East's abundant natural resources and raw materials can be imported to Bangladesh for value addition and re-exported to India or elsewhere. This is taking place but needs to be done on a much larger scale for a win-win situation, the envoy said.
Mr Ali referred to Bangladesh's growing cooperation with India's North-East. "It has achieved rapid development and its gathering further momentum," he said, adding "this is largely attributed to the generally peaceful and stable environment of the sub-region in the past several years".
He said, "Our opportunities are endless-once we are able to realise these, it would enormously contribute to taking the overall Bangladesh-India bilateral relations to a 'greater height'.
He expressed the hope that ITFAA would play an effective role in further strengthening the Indo-Bangladesh economic integration, especially with the north-east region.
Muazzem Ali said that political leaderships on both sides today recognise that the destinies of "our two neighboring countries are inescapably intertwined and we must grow together."
"It is a matter of great pleasure that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have taken the partnership between the two countries "far beyond a strategic partnership", touching upon "virtually all areas of human endeavour."
"Today, Bangladesh-India relations cover a widely divergent areas, including economic and commercial, border management, security, water sharing and water resource management, communication and connectivity, energy and power, education and cultural, agriculture and fisheries, biodiversity and numerous other issues of mutual interest," the envoy said.
Saying that both Bangladesh and India are growing fast, he called for combining the synergies of the two countries.
"If we can combine our synergies, India can emerge as a great contributor to the faster economic growth of Bangladesh as well as for the region through effective cooperation," he said.
Muazzem Ali stressed the need for further exploring the potentiality of cooperation between Bangladesh and India. The north-Eastern region of India could be a significant means to that end, he said.
