Bangladesh has become one of Asia’s most remarkable success stories in recent past as an important market for trade finance within Asia & the Pacific.
International Chamber of Commerce, Bangladesh (ICCB) President Mahbubur Rahman said it at the closing ceremony of a workshop on Wednesday.
The workshop, titled ICC Workshop on Trade Finance and Best Practices in Demand Guarantees, was organised by ICC Bangladesh at a city hotel.
The ICCB chief also said both clients and financial institutions have to streamline their trade activities to remain competitive in today’s changing environment.
The international trade volume of Bangladesh was $21 billion in 2005 and the amount went up to more than $95 billion in 2018, he added.
Speaking at the workshop, Mr. Rahman cautioned that with the growing business complexities, technological changes, market expectations and financial crimes, trade services are becoming increasingly challenging for banks and financial institutions of our country like other trading nations.
Time has come to identify the exposure of banks on international bank guarantees and to formulate guidelines and adopt international rules associated with bank guarantees and standby LCs, he mentioned.
The ICCB President observed Incidences of Trade Based Money Laundering (TBML) remains a growing concern for policy makers and central banks throughout the world.
Although the available sets of Anti Money Laundering (AML) rules are in line with globally accepted standards, there is still a lot of scope to improve their enforcements, mentioned Mahbubur Rahman.
Bangladesh Bank (BB) is working on TBML guideline which is expected to bring positive changes in enforcing better the AML rules, he hoped.
In his address, ICCB Banking Commission Chairman & CEO Bangladesh International Arbitration Centre (BIAC) Muhammad A. Ali (Rumee) pointed out four major risks in the trade finance for coming days.
They are Cyber Security, Illicit Flow, Fin-tech and contagious risk, he said and urged the participants to be cautious regarding these risks.
Workshop Resource Person Dr. Andrea Hauptmann, Senior Global Consultant on Trade Finance, Raiffeisen Bank International AG, Austria and ICCB Secretary General Ataur Rahman also spoke on the occasion.
A workshop on the same topic was held in Chittagong on 16 April. A total of 123 participants from banks, BIBM & Law Farm in Dhaka and 70 participants from banks in Chittagong attended the workshop.
