Bangladesh eyeing investors from Bahrain, says Minister

Bangladesh is eyeing a large number of investors from Bahrain. To achieve this objective, it has signed three important agreements with Bahrain that will facilitate trade and foreign investment between the two countries and the Bangladeshi Prime Minister will soon visit the Kingdom of Bahrain to realise these dreams into reality, says Bangladesh Foreign Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali.

He is on a two-day visit to Bahrain with a five-member delegation.

Speaking to DT News yesterday, he said that the Bahrain government had invited them to organise an Industrial Fair in Bahrain and they were going to do so during the visit of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wazed to Bahrain, which is expected in late January or early February. 

“A large delegation of businessmen will also come with their products to showcase at the fair,” he said.

The three agreements that have been signed between Bahrain and Bangladesh are: Protection of investments, avoidance of double taxation and annual foreign office consultations. 

Bangladesh has already signed the double taxation agreement with two Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries - Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

He said that Bangladesh was going to set up 100 special economic zones for the investors from around the world. Bangladesh had allocated special land to the private investors from Japan, China, India, South Korea and many other countries and now it was going to do the same for Bahrain.  In the special zones, one can set up any type of industries to export the goods to the foreign markets.

“Bangladesh has a demographic advantage and it wants to use it to the fullest extent possible,” he says.

“The ratio of the people between the ages of 15 and 65 years is very high in Bangladesh.”

He said that they were advancing on the path of development. Italy wants to relocate the leather industry to Bangladesh. They are going to have a nuclear power project with Russia and India is giving training to their scientists. They have also handed over the satellite system to the French company. 

“We have become a big pharmaceutical exporter to Saudi Arabia and Western Europe and recently we have given licences to the companies to export pharmaceutical goods to the United States of America,” he says. 

“We are going to give big push to the relations between Bahrain and Bangladesh,” he says. “The Secretary-General of the GCC countries will also visit Bangladesh in the coming days.” He said that the working environment in Bahrain was very good and they had not received any complaints whatsoever and wanted to use this environment for their benefit.

The bilateral trade volume between Bahrain and Bangladesh is not very extraordinary, but it is getting a lion’s share in the form of remittances. Bangladesh is getting $550 million annually in the form of remittances from Bahrain and it is aiming for more in the form of investments and the visit of the foreign minister is part of it. 

Bangladesh is the second largest expatriate community after India with almost 150,000 Bangladeshi nationals in Bahrain. The number of the Bangladeshis in Saudi Arabia is 2.5 million.

There are around 52,000 Bangladeshi illegal workers in Bahrain. Almost 25,000 illegal workers have benefited from the Amnesty scheme and the offices of Bangladesh Embassy will remain open for the issuance of out passes today (Wednesday) in spite of the fact that it is a holiday today.