The EU-Bangladesh Business Climate platform is set to be restructured for bringing more fruitful outcomes in the areas of business, investment and trade.
As part of the reshaping move into the key business platform with a bloc of 28 European nations, the authorities proposed merger with its existing 05 working groups into a combined one under EU-Bangladesh Business Climate Dialogue.
The proposal was made as the existing structure of the platform takes a lot of energy and time on both sides with very limited practical results so far, officials concerned said.
In this connection, European Union (EU) Ambassador to Bangladesh Rensje Teerink sent a draft reference document to the commerce ministry recently.
The EU envoy expected to reach a consensus on this new approach by the end of August and he thinks the document should be finalized and agreed ahead of the next round of Joint Working Group meeting.
According to the proposed draft reference document, the plenary session will take place twice a year at times mutually agreed by both the government of Bangladesh and EU side, with the incumbent commerce minister as chair of each session.
It will be co-chaired by the commerce secretary on the government side and EU ambassador on the EU side.
Key participants at the plenary session include EU member-state heads of diplomatic missions in Dhaka, co-chairs/leads of the Joint Working Group together with the EU private sector representatives, as well as government officials from various government authorities, as per relevance.
The key objective of the plenary session is to take stock of progress of the Joint Working Group and provide political guidance in order to find solutions and way forward to issues faced by EU investors in Bangladesh with the aim to improve the business environment for European investors and the ease of doing business overall.
In the letter, the EU envoy mentioned, "The five Working Groups merge into a single combined Joint Working Group. To simplify the process further, I would also propose that the new combined Joint Working Group deal with issue-based concerns of businesses and investors, rather than embark on discussion on a sectoral basis."
"One key challenge as I see in this format is to effectively engage other government authorities and to have their right representation at the Joint Working Group meeting. I believe this can be overcome with your leadership," she said.
When contacted, joint secretary (FTA-2) of the commerce ministry A.H.M. Shafiquzzaman said European Union has made a proposal for merger of five working groups into a combined one. In this regard, a meeting has been held recently.
He, however, said, "We both want to make the dialogue more result-oriented and engaging better other authorities concerned in the process."
The new draft reference document showed, "The aim of the combined Joint Working Group is to discuss the issues linked to trade and investment barriers and any other relevant matters at technical level and find concrete solutions for them and present the progress at plenary session for the government to consider implementing needed reforms."
Joint Working Group will focus on issue-based concerns of EU businesses and investors. An agenda for the Joint Working Group discussion will be agreed beforehand between the EU and the commerce ministry, the reference reads.
On the EU side, Deputy Head of Mission of the EU Delegation to Bangladesh will co-chair/lead the new Joint Working Group together with Economic and Commercial Counsellors of EU member states' diplomatic missions in Dhaka and representatives from the EU private sector. On the government side (to be completed by the commerce ministry).
The Joint Working Group can meet several times between the plenaries and should meet at minimum ahead of each plenary session for the sake of better outcome in discussion.
Follow-up meetings/phone calls can be organized whenever needed, as convenient for both sides.
The participation in meetings by representatives of the EU private sector is an integral part to feed the dialogue process with important information, insights and analysis on the ease of doing business in Bangladesh.
Therefore, the EU private sector representatives will take an active role in the Joint Working Group discussions.
The format of the Joint Working Group can change on the basis of decision at a plenary session or as suitable towards better addressing the business concerns of EU economic operators in Bangladesh.
Currently, there are now five Joint Working Groups that created on ad-hoc basis to meet, discuss and find solutions in five key areas.
The five Key areas are: (1) Import duty/customs/trade facilitation, 2) pharmaceuticals (3) Licences and investment in the service sector (4) Financial flows (5) Tax regime that are co-chaired by five representatives on each side and meet ahead of every plenary session.
The EU-Bangladesh Business Climate dialogue was initiated on May 16, 2016 between the EU Business Council in Dhaka and the commerce ministry, with an aim to jointly remove impediments that obstruct EU trade and investment in Bangladesh, under the leadership of former commerce minister Tofail Ahmed and former EU ambassador Pierre Mayaudon.
Five 'EU-Bangladesh Business Climate Dialogue' have been held so far.
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