Hasina seeks US investors; offers attractive facilities
“The US is, of course, the largest investor in Bangladesh with stakes in energy, banking and insurance sectors. We invite US investment in other lucrative sectors like ICT, renewable energy, shipbuilding, automobile, light engineering, agro-processing, blue economy, tourism, knowledge based hi-tech industries,” she said.
Hasina made the call while delivering her speech at the Executive Business Roundtable of US-Bangladesh Business Council at Lotte Palace here on Tuesday.
US-Bangladesh Business Council president Nisha Biswal presided over the event.
Hasina said Bangladesh is investing heavily on infrastructure development and power supply to facilitate FDI in those areas and other promising sectors in Bangladesh.
The Prime Minister said Bangladesh is ready to start Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations with the US at an appropriate time.
As per the ADB Outlook 2019, she said, Bangladesh is the fastest growing economy in the Asia-Pacific region due to strong leadership, good governance, stable government, political stability, sound macroeconomic policy and right development priorities.
“Rapid urbanization, increasing consumption of electricity, rapid growth of the middle class, growing connectivity with a massive regional market make Bangladesh an attractive investment destination,” Hasina said.
She said Bangladesh is ready to offer from its 100 Economic Zones, one exclusively for American companies, and also invites US investment in its 28 High-Tech Parks. “We’re constantly improving our physical, legal and financial infrastructures, and also connectivity as with Padma Bridge and Dhaka Metro-Rail.”
Hasina mentioned that Bangladesh has the most liberal investment policy in South Asia and that foreign investment is protected by acts of parliament and bilateral treaties. “Bangladesh recognizes US’s energy sector cooperation and investment, which has contributed towards building our power generation capacity, now over 25,000 Megawatt.”
She also said Bangladesh is looking forward to US investment in renewable energy. “Our ICT sector is growing fast now with a billion-dollar export to 60 countries, with the US being the top destination. The ICT industry is expected to grow nearly five fold to reach the five-billion-dollar mark with more than 600,000 free-lance IT professionals, Bangladesh is the right place to invest in the ICT sector.”
