The Saudi Arabia-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SABCCI) on Friday started a new journey from its permanent office at capital’s Gulshan, with a promise to intensify bilateral investment and trade ties.
At the inaugural of their new office, the trade body’s President Ashraful Haq Chowdhury said, “For years, we’ve been confined to traditional ties like human resource export and goods import.”
But trade balance is heavily tilted towards Saudi Arab as Bangladesh exports to the Middle Eastern country is only $300 million per year, while imports $1.8 billion worth of goods and services.
Ashraful said there is ample scope to lure huge investment from Saudi Arab and ears more remittances through exporting skilled manpower.
The upcoming international expo in 2030 and the World Cup Football event in 2034 can create a huge opportunity for Bangladesh, where the chamber can play a key role.
According to the chamber leaders, the potential sectors can be cyber security, agriculture, ship export and military equipment export.
The SABCCI president said Bangladesh can benefit a lot through leasing in agricultural land in Saudi Arab. “Our main goal is triple export, triple growth.”
Former ambassador to Saudi Arab Golam Masi pointed to the fact that Bangladesh lack necessary platform for Saudi Arab’s investment in Bangladesh even though many large companies, including Aramco, had shown their interest in investing in the South Asian nation.
Foreign Secretary Md Nazrul Islam identified that Bangladeshi businessmen have a lack of interest in exporting to Saudi Arab mainly because of language problem
However, he believes that it is very much possible to raise Bangladesh’s exports to Saudi Arab to $3-4 billion within three to four years, if necessary steps are taken.
He said out of 35 lakh Bangladeshis working in Saudi Arab, nearly five lakh are unemployed because nearly 97 percent of local fortune seekers are unskilled.
He suggested that Bangladesh must take necessary steps to upskill its workforce so that it can capture a large share of the demand for fresh workforce to be created by the upcoming international expo and the World Cup football.The event was also attended by former bureaucrats M Mokammel Haque and Syed Margub Murshed, and Senior Land Secretary ASM Saleh Ahmed and President of the International Chamber of Commerce, Bangladesh (ICC-B) Mahbubur Rahman, among others.