Hasina-Naoto Summit
Funding for Padma Bridge, trade to top agenda
Financing for Padma Bridge, strengthening economic cooperation and expansion of bilateral trade and investment will figure prominently at the summit level talks between the prime ministers of Bangladesh and Japan during Sheikh Hasina's visit to Japan beginning November 28.
“This is going to be a very important, timely and significant visit by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Her summit meeting with Prime Minister Naoto Kan will further strengthen bilateral relations,” said Japanese Ambassador in Dhaka Tamotsu Shinotsuka yesterday.
He said a positive discussion would be taking place on financing the Padma Bridge and assured that Japan will continue its financial assistance to Bangladesh for infrastructure development programmes.
Sheikh Hasina, who is now visiting Russia, will pay a four-day official working visit to Japan from November 28 and the summit level meeting will take place in Tokyo on November 29. As the prime minister, it will be her second visit to Japan after 13 years since she visited Japan in 1997.
The ambassador while speaking at meet the reporters programme at Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU) said Japan wants to make their presence in expansion of trade and investment in a big way and remove the huge trade gap with Bangladesh.
He said many Japanese are paying attention to Bangladesh as the country has high prospect as a production base and a destination for foreign direct investment.
Although Japan is the largest bilateral donor to Bangladesh and cumulative assistance amounted more than $ 8 billion, bigger than combined assistance from US and the UK, but he said that bilateral trade and investment is not that big.
The total investment of Japan in Bangladesh registered with Board of Investment is $ 1,207 million on a cumulative basis, which is the 6th largest foreign investing country while Japan 's investment in Bepza is $ 171 million.
The Japanese envoy listed out several obstacles like shortage of electricity and gas, transportation, road infrastructure, traffic jam, deep seaport and complexity of rules for setting up industries.
He said Bangladesh has the immense possibility to attract huge investment from Japan if the government can remove those obstacles. In this context, he said Japanese companies are diversifying their businesses and Bangladesh could be one of the possible destinations for them after China.
About current crisis of gas and electricity in Bangladesh, the ambassador said coal could be considered as an alternative energy and hydropower could be another possible option. For hydropower, he said cooperation with India, Bhutan and Nepal is important.
He said regional cooperation becomes more and more important for the future prosperity. “Bangladesh is located in the midst of India, China and Asean. Bangladesh could open up a new horizon if it fully leverage such location advantage,” he added.
Lauding Bangladesh's steady growth of 6 percent over past several years, Ambassador Tamotsu Shinotsuka said Bangladesh has great potentials to achieve 8 percent economic growth following China and India if the investment friendly atmosphere could be created.
The ambassador said the urgent task of Bangladesh government is to nurture next core industry after RMG. Bangladesh government should decide its priority industries and concentrate resources there, he added.
He identified changes of policy with the change of government in Bangladesh as a major problem and said once the policy is set, it should be pursued consistently as did by Japan after the war.
The Japanese ambassador, who has been in Bangladesh for around 15 months, made a 5-point suggestions for development of Bangladesh.
These include: development of social infrastructure and more skilled workers for industrialisation, decision on priority industries and basic infrastructures like transportation, telecommunication and industrial equipments to be in place.
DRU president Shamim Ahmed chaired the press interactions while joint secretary Galman Shafi made remarks about DRU.
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