US ambassador to Bangladesh Marcia Stephens Bloom Bernicat called for simplification of business processes and improving the ease of doing business, to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) from American businesses.
The envoy came up with the suggestion on Monday, after a meeting with Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed at his secretariat office.
“Every economy of the world requires FDI since countries cannot drive economic growth by only their domestic resources,” said Bernicat.
She added that the barriers to getting investment into a country also slows down the nation’s domestic trade.
There is a lot of talks about developing one stop service. A company has to balance at doing business somewhere else as more expenses are involved to set a business, said the envoy adding that a company wants to do thing effervescently and inexpensively as possible.
“A company that wants to create employment and sell quality products to customers should not have to go to multiple bureaucratic offices to set up their business,” added Bernicat.
The United States is the single largest export destination for Bangladesh. Besides, the US is the third largest source for the country’s inward remittance.
Bernicat explained that they were not satisfied with this achievement. They want to increase all indicators, particularly bringing more US investment in Bangladesh.
She also mentioned the projects of Summit Power with General Electronics as an example of what the US wants to do here.
Bernicat also praised the government’s efforts in improving the supply of electricity and the quality of Bangladesh’s ports.
“We have seen tremendous progress in the last three years in electricity generation,” she said, adding that the government has a very aggressive agenda on building more power plants and more diversified electricity.
Secondly, physical infrastructure like roads, bridges and ports are also being constructed for economic growth, she said.
Underlining faster services at air ports and sea ports, the Ambassador said goods that coming can get released within hours instead of days.
Talking about the business environment, Bernicat said: “Ease of doing business is really important. You don't have to jump by 20 points, but each year ease of doing should be getting better.”
The US Ambassador explained that this will send a very strong signal to investors that this country is serious about attracting investment. Regarding corruption, she said that it exists all over the country.
Every dollar you spend, whether it is public or private, should be useful toward economic growth and products improvement rather than siphoning off, she added.
