The government is eyeing huge foreign investment this year while assuring new opportunities to investors across the globe to increase their diversification and profit from Bangladesh.
As part of its move, the government has relaxed several laws to reduce complexities for foreign investors.
To attract foreign direct investment (FDI) in the New Year, Bangladesh Bank (BB) and the National Board of Revenue (NBR) are working on several issues to facilitate foreign investors.
A BB official said the central bank will declare separate circulars on providing many facilities to foreign investors including easing the repatriation of money and foreign currency exchange.
He said foreign investors can send a higher amount of the declared turnover between 1 percent and $1 lakh abroad in service charges without prior approval of the central bank.
Foreign employers have the opportunity to open foreign currency accounts, he said adding that they have to send their salaries to their respective countries from company accounts.
Moreover, the government is working to establish 100 special economic zones in the country by 2030.
93 economic zones have already been approved. The government has plans to build a big economic zone in Chattogram this year. Almost three million people would be employed in the area.
Paban Chowdhury, Executive Chairman of BEZA said many investors of different countries have shown interest in investing in the special economic zones of Bangladesh.
“We are working to create an investment-friendly culture for all foreign businessmen to attract foreign direct investment,” he mentioned.
In this regard, the central bank, NBR and Finance Ministry have arranged several meetings to ensure a proper environment for investors, he added.
Many Japanese and Chinese companies have shown interest in investing in the country, which will help boost the economy, he mentioned.
Md Sirazul Islam, executive chairman of the Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA), said ‘we are working to create business-friendly environment for investors by improving ease of doing business.’
In this case, the government services must be delivered digitally very quickly, he said adding, “We need to make sustainable development, not just development, our development is not just for one generation, and it needs to be integrated for future generations.”
At present, we are providing 41 investment services online, he mentioned.
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He hopes BIDA can provide 150 investment services from 35 companies within this year.
However, foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows to Bangladesh went down by 31.79 percent or $1.15 billion during January-June in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
This was $1.69 billion in the same period of the previous the year.
During the time, the global FDI flows decreased by 49 percent to $399 billion against $777 billion in the same period of the previous year.
