Bangladesh is planning to halve the import of used clothes from the current level by 2024 and to zero by 2026 even as the country has prepared the draft of the new import policy for 2021-2024, recommending restrictions on importing used clothes.

Media reports maintained this citing the Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh.

Speaking to the media, the Commerce Secretary, reportedly, maintained a complete ban on the import of used clothes at the moment was not recommended considering the poverty in Bangladesh — the percentage of poor people living on less than 2 dollars a day was 20 per cent of the population in 2019 – even as the number of poor people has, reportedly, increased of late on account of the pandemic’s fallouts, as per some think-tanks.

For information, as per the current import policy, an importer is allowed to bring in six tonnes of sweaters, ladies cardigans, men’s trousers and men’s jackets and two tonnes of old blankets apart from two tonnes of apparels made of man-made synthetic fibre.