The government has planned to organise an investment expo or a roadshow in Australia within a month or two, aiming to attract Australian investment in Bangladesh.
As part of the exercise, the Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) has asked the Bangladesh High Commission in Australia to send a proposal with fixing time, venue and cost of holding the event preferably in December next or early 2022.
The ministries concerned, including the commerce ministry, would be included in the move, according to the BIDA.
In 2019, the Bangladesh High Commission, Australia had organised a trade conference in the developed country to bag Australian investment, according to the BIDA document.
Currently, there is a strong trade bonding between Bangladesh and Australia. Since 2003, Bangladesh as an LDC is enjoying duty- and quota-free market access to the Australian market.
Currently, the bilateral trade between Bangladesh and Australia stands at around US$ 2.0 billion. But Australian investment in Bangladesh is very poor among the South Asian countries, the document showed.
According to the Australia trade and investment strategy paper, in 2019, Australia was the 13th largest economic power. It had US$10.9 trillion equivalent assets as of December 2019.
Until June 2020, Australian investment in Bangladesh stood at US$845 million which mainly went to the gas and petroleum sectors.
Bangladesh is an emerging economy among the Asian nations and is set to graduate from the status of a least developed country (LDC) to a developing country officially in 2026.
The country also aims to become a developed nation by 2041. Aiming to achieve the goals, the BIDA document emphasised the need for export diversification and meeting internal demand for the country's overall development.
In the fiscal year 2019-20, Bangladesh exported goods worth $678 million to Australia and $805 million in the previous FY.
On the other hand, Bangladesh's imports from Australia cost U$649 million in FY 2019-20, up from U$597 million in the previous FY.
Bangladesh's major export items included apparel, textiles, footwear, articles of leather, frozen fish, jute, pharmaceuticals, and ceramics.
On the other hand, Bangladesh's top imports from Australia are cotton, edible vegetables, cereals, copper, iron and steel, paper, zinc, and machinery, among others.
