Sukanta Halder

Shopping centres, fashion houses and retail outlets are recording higher sales on the occasion of Durga Puja as worshippers are gearing up to celebrate the biggest religious festival of the Bengali Hindu community.

The government has targeted an annual average productivity growth rate of 5.6 per cent for the next 10 years as it is set to begin implementing the Bangladesh National Productivity Master Plan from January next year.

It calls its hefty discount offers tornado, typhoon, kalbaishakhi (Nor’wester), conflagration and Tufan (hurricane) and sells mobile phones, flats, cars and whatnot.

Appetite for purchases through online platforms using cards declined in July this year from that a month ago, as people have become cautious in placing orders following a series of scams centring e-commerce companies having started to come to light.

Qcoom has suspended its physical operations after hundreds of customers thronged its office in Dhaka, demanding products or refunds amid the e-commerce platform’s failure to make deliveries within the promised dates despite receiving payments in advance.

E-commerce firmly began to put down roots in Bangladesh back in 2009 and since then has gone on to become a mainstay in the retail landscape.

Lured by hefty discounts at e-commerce platform Eorange, Md Sahedul Islam, a private firm employee with a Tk 15,000 monthly income, borrowed Tk 13 lakh from family members, relatives and colleagues to make advance payments for five motorcycles in May and another three in June.  

Many Dhaka residents are well aware about the milkman, known as “goala” in Bangla, who delivers fresh milk to their doorsteps on a daily basis.

The Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation (BSCIC) is all set to launch an e-commerce platform enabling local entrepreneurs to sell different products in the domestic and global markets.

Md Nabid Rahman, employed at a private company in Dhaka, made a payment of Tk 12.5 lakh to e-commerce platform Dhamaka in March for two motorcycles and other products which were on offer at hefty discounts.

Pran-RFL Group, one of the leading conglomerates in Bangladesh, plans to double its plastic recycling capacity to make new products from thrown away items.

The Insurance Development and Regulatory Authority (IDRA) has taken up an initiative to make all industries and factories adopt group insurance, made mandatory in the Bangladesh labour law, against the backdrop of recent tragedies in the industrial sector.

Rights violations have compounded sufferings of consumers in Bangladesh, with the number of complaints rising a staggering 61 per cent in the span of a year.

The Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation (BSCIC) has sought a Tk 1,000 crore stimulus package from the government to disburse loans for the development and expansion of the cottage industry and SMEs.

Two decades past its establishment, the Jamdani industrial estate is plagued with multifaceted problems and is nowhere near living up to expectations.

In 2018, Bangladesh Fire Service and Civil Defense department initiated a three-year project to expand their “diving unit” to reduce the devastating number of deaths from drowning in the country.

Business of hotels and resorts in tourist destinations is rebounding slowly as the Delta Covid-19 variant and dengue have turned customers very cautious over whether they would go on holidays.

The National Zoo authorities have earned Tk 32.9 lakh by selling 47 deer this year, the same as the last five years’ total.

The father wanted to have a son, who would grow up and shoulder the responsibility of taking care of the penniless family. But fate did not allow such a desire, and so, a girl was born, to his disappointment.

Naturally it was expected for the BSCIC to create a framework for commercial planning and training, production and marketing for weavers.