Even as Bangladesh is inching closer towards the LDC graduation (which would catapult the country to the big league of developing nations but will also come with its own share of challenges), Bangladesh Government has adopted policy for executing bilateral agreements on preferential and free trade with various countries.
According to media reports, this was underlined by Finance minister AHM Mustafa Kamal while unveiling the 2021-22 fiscal budget before the parliament on 3 June (Thursday), even as he, reportedly, stated that bilateral preferential trade agreements and free trade agreements were either being signed or finalised to meet the challenges in global trade following the Bangladesh’s transition from LDC status.
Under the status 100 Bangladeshi products will get duty-free access to Bhutan and 34 Bhutanese products will get the same facility in Bangladesh market, reportedly, stated the Finance Minister while adding that PTA negotiations with Nepal were at the final stage even as he underlined significant progress has also been made in formal talks aimed at signing a bilateral PTA with Indonesia while work on a joint study aimed at conducting an FTA with Sri Lanka was at the final stage.
Further, feasibility studies have been completed to assess trade potentials for signing of PTA/FTA with different countries, such as Japan, Malaysia, Eurasian Economic Commission, Vietnam, Thailand while feasibility of signing trade agreements with Jordan, USA, China, Mali, Macedonia, Myanmar, Iraq, Nigeria, Mauritius and Lebanon is being explored, maintained the Finance Minister while adding that an initiative had also been taken to conduct a joint feasibility study on the proposed Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) between Bangladesh and India as well.
