Rohingya influx brings changes in local economy


FE Team | Published: December 12, 2017 19:51:29 | Updated: December 13, 2017 11:29:46


Photo: Reuters

The influx of Rohingya people has created new economic opportunities for local community and development of roads adjacent to many camp areas.

British newspaper The Guardian pictured the migration, subsequent surviving condition of Rohingyas and economic conditions thereby.

Besides, it also picked up the local people's economic activities circling the Rohingya influx. 

Although locals and displaced Myanmar people both are facing misery, some local entrepreneurs are getting more benefit after the influx.

Displaced Rohingya people also making some profits like locals.

Nurul Afsar is one of such entrepreneurial persons. He has transport business.

He said, “Once upon a time, there were no refugees here and the road was bad, and I didn’t like to come here even if I was paid 500 taka”.

“But now, the road is okay and there are so many passengers. So I love to work here,” says Afsar.

Kutupalong is the most populous camp. A bustling market adjoining to the camp known as Lamba Chiya Bazar has sprung up in few weeks.

Stalls and shacks line the road, selling everything from food to clothing and electrical goods.

Abdul Shakkur, 35, runs an eatery nearby. Shakkur paid 8,000 taka for the site, and now employs three staff, who receives 700 taka a day. He makes a daily profit of 1,000 to 1,500 taka and this amount is “enough to provide for his wife and parents”.

He said few Rohingyas eat there as they are largely reliant on food aid. It is other Bangladeshi vendors who come for lunch.

For the small number of Rohingya who run businesses, the picture is bleaker.

Mir Kashim, 70, from Foira Bazar in Maungdaw Township in Myanmar, has a stall with a dirt floor and homemade benches. For two months, he has been selling tea, cigarettes, pulses and betel nut.

“I brought some money from Myanmar, which I changed for 500 taka,” Kashim says. “Then we got a loan of 4,000 taka from our community”.

Every morning, Kashim buys goods on credit from wholesalers in Kutupalong and repays them in the evening.

He also pays the landowner, a local government official who controls the area, 10 to 20 taka a day. Kashim’s little shop makes between 200 and 300 taka a day, and supports five families.

Other refugees have sold jewellery or received money from relatives abroad to start their businesses.

As Rohingya refugees are not allowed to travel, they can only buy goods from wholesalers in the towns around which the camps are built.

Montudash, 40, a local shop owner, estimates that 95 per cent of his customers are refugees, who buy everything from pots to cables to soft drinks.

On the other hand, the Rohingya entrepreneurs have to deal with extortive wholesalers and thugs from nearby villages who frequently threaten to destroy their shops.

More than 630,000 Rohingya people have arrived Bangladesh since August this year.

The Rohingya people have started arriving in Bangladesh in response to the state-sponsored violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine state.

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