Foreign investors in Bangladesh yesterday urged the government to take an immediate initiative to denationalise the operation and management of New Mooring Container Terminal of Chittagong Port.
They said the efficient operation and management of the container terminal is of utmost importance for Bangladesh to attract foreign direct investment (FDI).
Masih Ul Karim, president of the Foreign Investors Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), placed the demand at the chamber's monthly luncheon meeting in Dhaka. Commerce Minister Altaf Hossain Choudhury attended the meeting as a guest of honor, while Peter May, vice president, and M A Matin, secretary of FICCI, among other foreign investors in Bangladesh, were present.
FICCI president said for maintaining the smooth flow of FDI transparent operation of container terminals is needed, as some neighbouring countries are providing such management facilities in their terminals.
"So, government should appoint a competent operator having proven track record in such management," he said.
Karim said the investment and trade related policies of Bangladesh are liberal and attractive for foreign direct investment. The macro-economic fundamentals are sound and incentive package for investment is excellent.
However he said, "Lack of proper governance, law and order situation, corruption, inadequate infrastructure and last but not the least -- contract sanctity -- are the major areas of concern for foreign investors, both existing and prospective ones".
Therefore, the government should formulate a comprehensive trade policy encompassing both export and import trades without any further loss of time to face the challenges and achieve the desired economic growth.
Moreover, he said it is being observed that the government is not moving fast enough to ensure that the country's laws and regulations relating to trade are in conformity with the WTO agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS).
Although, there are laws existing in the country for protection of intellectual property rights (IPR), these are not adequate and it takes years, even at times decades to get redress by the owners of IPR, he added.
Addressing the meeting, the commerce minister said in the last few years we received a huge amount of FDI in Bangladesh, which proves that Bangladesh is a safe harbour for FDI.
He said, "We offer a lot of incentives packages to encourage FDI in both export processing zones and outside the zones in Bangladesh. As part of wooing FDI, we are working to set up another EPZ in the country."
