Bangladesh forms national committee for ‘doing business reforms’

Bangladesh has formed a national committee to monitor the implementation of the ‘doing business’ reforms.

Senior Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 24 Sept 2017, 05:18 PM
Updated : 24 Sept 2017, 05:18 PM

The Cabinet secretary is the chair of the 15-strong National Committee for Monitoring and Implementation of Doing Business Reforms (NCMID).

A gazette was published on Sept 21 in this regard, the state-entity Bangladesh Investment Development Authority or BIDA, which will serve as its secretariat, said in a statement on Sunday.

Bangladesh now ranks 176th out of 190 in the World Bank ranking’s on ‘ease of doing business’ index.

BIDA has set an ambitious target of securing a place below 100 by 2021, which means an improvement by at least 15 notches would be required a year.

BIDA Executive Chairman Kazi M Aminul Islam

All the process of starting a business can be completed by seven days now in place of 19.5 days before, as part of the reforms.

With the constitution of the committee, BIDA said Bangladesh’s efforts to raise its position on the ease of doing business index will get a “significant momentum”.

The national committee is entrusted to monitor implementation progress of short, medium and long term reform recommendations as agreed in the Doing Business Reform Memorandum 2017 and subsequent Action Plan.

It will provide guidance to the reform-implementing agencies in removing any challenges faced during implementation and encourage the reform-implementing agencies to adopt doing business reform targets in respective Annual Performance Agreement (APA) and other institutional performance matrices.

The committee will also recommend for any resource allocation to support better capacities for reform adoption and implementation and undertake any relevant activities required to expedite implementation of doing business reforms, BIDA said.

The committee can co-opt any new member and invite relevant persons from public and private sectors.

There are 10 indicators on which the World Bank’s ranking system is based on. They include starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency.