RMG export growth may remain sluggish for global slowdown

The growth of exports in the country's apparel sector is likely to remain sluggish in the current fiscal year (FY), due to the ongoing global slowdown, exporters said on 24th January 2012.

They said the export growth of ready-made garments (RMG) and knitwears would be below 20 per cent in the current FY against around 42 per cent in the previous fiscal year when the apparel sector fetched a record $17.9 billion.

Experts said despite a persistent global slowdown, mainly in the United States and the European Union, the growth in garments exports were still encouraging and remarkable.

The European Union and the United States take more than 90 per cent of Bangladesh apparel products, officials of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) said.

In the first half of the current FY the exports of woven items grew by 22.56 per cent to $4.46 billion while knit posted 11.12 per cent growth to $4.79 billion, according to the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB).

During the same period in the last FY 2011 woven and knit registered a growth of 40.79 per cent and 43.39 per cent respectively, the EPB data said.

This year export of woven garments made a great stride compared to the growth of knit products because of the increase in their demand with the European Union offering EBA (everything but arms) facility under the generalised system of preference, traders said.

The BGMEA had set an export target of $20.29 billion at the onset of the current FY, when the overall exports were projected at $26.5 billion.

"We may not reach the target set for the current FY, but definitely the exports will be more than what we achieved in the apparel sector last fiscal year," Md. Shafiul Islam Mohiuddin, president of BGMEA told the FE.

"The exports are still satisfactory despite the bad days(slowdown)," the BGMEA president added.

Meanwhile, the overall exports crossed $11 billion mark in the first half of the current FY and as such officials of the ministry of commerce (MoC) said they were confident of meeting the overall export target by the end of the FY.

Apparel exports constitute 80 per cent of the overall exports, they said.

"Big export growth does not recur every year. But the growth which we have achieved in the first half of the current fiscal is very much remarkable," Nasir Uddin Chowdhury, a senior vice president of BGMEA said.

Reference : Nizam Ahmed (FE)

Pharmaceuticals export to reach RMG level soon: Minister

Incepta Pharmaceuticals Ltd Wednesday formally inaugurated the country's' first ever vaccine plant -- Incepta Vaccine Ltd at Savar in Dhaka making a major breakthrough in the history of the country's pharmaceuticals sector.

Health minister AFM Ruhal Haque inaugurated the 75,000 sqft plant with an investment of Tk 2.0 billion at Zirabo in Savar which started production since June, 2011. The annual production capacity of the plant is 108 million vials and 72 million ampoules.

Incepta Vaccine is now manufacturing and marketing Typhoid, Rabbies and Tetanus vaccines. The company plans to manufacture vaccines for Hepatitis-B, Polio, Measles, Rubella, and Tetanus antitoxin, Pentavalent and other necessary vaccines in near future.

"Bangladesh has to spend a huge foreign currency as it totally depends on import for the vaccines. The country now can save foreign currency as well as provide lower cost and high potency vaccines to its people," said Abdul Muktadir, managing director of Incepta Pharmaceuticals.

He said there is high possibility of counterfeit product and doubt over potency of imported vaccines as it is very difficult to maintain cold chain for the products. But locally produced vaccines will now get longer shelf life with fast delivery guarantee, he added.

Health secretary Humayun Kabir, National Professor M R Khan, Director General of Drug Administration Major General Md Abul Kalam Azad and Director of Primary Health Care and Line Director of MNC and AH Dr Syed Abu Jafar Md Musa were also present during the inaugural function as special guests. Hasneen Muktadir, Director, Planning and Commercial, Mahbubul Karim, Director, Technical Operations and senior executives of Incepta were also present at the programme.

In his presentation on the plant, Mr Muktadir said Bangladesh is free from polio though it is not declared by World Health Organisation (WHO). Every year the country needs 90 million doses of vaccines for the governments' expanded programme of immunization (EPI) and another 30 million doses are purchased through private sector.

"Worldwide there is no type 2 wild polio virus and only 1 and 3 polio viruses are there. But Bangladesh imports type 2 polio vaccines which is unnecessary," he said.

The health minister said the government will look into the matter of unnecessarily using type 2 polio vaccine. "Also there is hardly any reason for importing vaccines if those are available locally," he added.

He said there are many big pharmaceutical companies which did not dare manufacture vaccines while Incepta took the risk. He urged the manufacturers to produce high quality and affordable vaccines for the poor.

The minister said pharmaceuticals export will soon reach the level of garments export as it has more value addition than RMG sector.

Pediatrician M R Khan said he himself first introduced vaccination for the Bangladeshi children in January, 1965 which faced hard time to be popularised as it had side effects at that time.

"The initiative of Incepta will be much helpful for the country's children. The pharmaceuticals industry has made a history in the industrialisation process," he said.

He said the government spends Tk 3.8 billion and the private sector spends Tk 3.5 billion every year for importing vaccines many of which will now be available in the country.

"Many countries could not even produce medicines while Bangladesh is producing hi-tech product like vaccines in a short course of time which is amazing," he said. He suggested setting up of national vaccine testing laboratory and modernisation of the existing public health laboratory.

Humayun Kabir said the government will consider how to reduce dependence on imported vaccines by procuring locally manufactured ones. He asked the vaccine manufacturing companies to provide the government with cold chain facilities which will be an added advantage.

Brain drain is taking its toll

The government is planning to launch a crackdown on the foreign nationals staying illegally in the country over the year. A report, quoting intelligence sources, said the number of such illegal foreigners is rising steadily. Most of them are working in the country's various business establishments for long.

According to the report published in a vernacular daily this week, such workers are allegedly remitting abroad illegally a good sum of money, involving transactions in foreign exchange through informal channel in the absence of proper monitoring by the authorities concerned. No effective measures have been taken so far against them excepting some occasional roundups.

The report said more than 2,00,000 foreigners were staying illegally in Bangladesh. A high-level committee was also formed earlier by the government to track down them. The committee's report did not see the light of the day as yet.

In fact, many local business houses have allegedly employed such foreign nationals for getting more profits and businesses. Usually they are hired by companies engaged in indenting, readymade garments (RMG), textile, information technology (IT) and energy sectors. Most of these undocumented workers are from Thailand, India, Sri Lanka and Korea. Many have feared that security risks might be involved surrounding the foreign nationals working clandestinely.

Bangladesh, itself being a country of a huge manpower resource, is having this sort of unusal immigrant problem for the last few years. Slowly but steadily, such foreigners are entering the country in the name of investors, experts and 'extra-ordinary' qualified professionals. In the name of investors, many foreigners have arrived and established their offices in the posh metropolitan areas and are resorting to many types of informal or clandestine businesses. Finding no jobs in their home country, many information technology (IT) specialists have come to Bangladesh and opened IT training centres throughout the country. They are minting money from the local citizens by offering cheap IT courses that are helping the locals to emerge as computer operators, not specialists.

A section of local businessmen, in league with some corrupt government officials, are apparently giving cover to such illegal immigrants. Knowingly or unknowingly, the government has so far failed to take any action against such illegal migrants. These foreigners are contributing nothing of substantive nature to the country's economy. Instead, they are sending out hefty amounts of money in valuable foreign exchange. The Bangladeshis abroad are themselves earnestly striving hard, doing tough jobs for remitting home their savings from earnings, after meeting their living expenses in the countries where they are employed as the expatriate workers.

For extended illegal stay of foreigners in Bangladesh, local business houses assign special officers to 'manage' getting legal or forged work permits from the authorities concerned. In the same way, their visas are extended in connivance with a section of passport and immigration officials, 'graft' being one major way for managing such things. Even at the expiry of one's contract, he finds no trouble in leaving the country with their income earnings here.

The owners of some cent per cent export-oriented garments industries are reported to be hiring expatriates to get more work orders for their own businesses. It is important to examine closely and clearly whether such expatriates are serving the interests of such Bangladesh-based industries or promoting, by proxy, the course of businesses of their countries of origin, neglecting those of their employers who are based here.

What is baffling for the government is that such foreigners are having a gradual grip on the country's promising sectors like information technology (IT), telecommunications, energy, mining, exploration of oil wells etc. Some of them are involved in country's financial sector as well. This trend gives a disconcerting signal for the country.

There is no denying that some genuine investors are sometimes harassed on arrival at the country's entry points or red-tape hinders their moves to set up industrial units in Bangladesh. But there are also serious allegations -- and not necessarily all without some valid reasons -- about some fake investors arriving in the country and making quick money through their clandestine or unauthorised business transactions. The presence of such illegal foreign nationals is reportedly boosting inter-country gold and narcotic smuggling and currency racketeering syndicates -- using Bangladesh as a corridor and transit route. They are also allegedly involved in human trafficking and illegal manpower export businesses.

On its part, Bangladesh has also lost some of its native talents -- nuclear scientists, physicians, IT specialists, meritorious teachers and students, engineers, geologists, pharmacists etc., as they have left the country over the years in search of fortunes in the rich industrialised nations. Bangladesh could not afford to offer attractive compensation packages to retain them within the country or establish quality centres of excellence in the domain of post-graduation studies to its promising young talents for which they have to seek admission to universities at abroad in order to pursue higher studies. Now such a good number of Bangladeshi expatriates are in better positions and many of them are heading some leading sectoral entities of the business enterprises or government agencies in those countries at abroad. There have been no serious efforts to persuade them to return to their own homeland. Unfortunately, the void created by the brain drain is now being filled up by a group of foreign nationals, though not necessarily all being highly skilled or talented in their respective 'professional' fields. This is, of course, not a healthy sign for the country.

The government needs to take necessary steps for safeguarding the country's interests and putting an effective brake on illegal transfer of funds to abroad. National interest has to be protected, first of all. Taxes and duties must be collected properly from all foreign nationals, earning their incomes have not been legal. Repatriation of indenting commission needs to be ensured through official channels to stop money laundering and to enforce the accountability of all those involved in business-related activities by disallowing illegal stay of the foreigners and their unlawful businesses.

There is no time to waste for taking the right decision in right time. Indeed, the sooner such effective measures are taken against such illegal foreigners, the better will be its outcome for the future of the country.

Referrer: Shahiduzzaman Khan

Grameenphone telecom's history

  Grameenphone

 

The company has so far invested more than BDT 10,700 crore (USD 1.6 billion) to build the network infrastructure since its inception in 1997. It has invested over BDT 3,100 crore (USD 450 million) during the first three quarters of 2007 while BDT 2,100 crore (USD 310 million) was invested in 2006 alone. Grameenphone is also one the largest taxpayers in the country, having contributed nearly BDT 7000 crore in direct and indirect taxes to the Government Exchequer over the years. Of this amount, over BDT 2000 crore was paid in 2006 alone.

Since its inception in March 1997, Grameenphone has built the largest cellular network in the country with over 10,000 base stations in more than 5700 locations. Presently, nearly 98 percent of the country's population is within the coverage area of the Grameenphone network.

Grameenphone is the first operator to introduce the pre-paid service in September 1999. It established the first 24-hour Call Center, introduced value-added services such as VMS, SMS, fax and data transmission services, international roaming service, WAP, SMS-based push-pull services, EDGE, personal ring back tone and many other products and services.

The entire Grameenphone network is also EDGE/GPRS enabled, allowing access to high-speed Internet and data services from anywhere within the coverage area. There are currently nearly 3 million EDGE/GPRS users in the Grameenphone network.

Grameenphone nearly doubled its subscriber base during the initial years while the growth was much faster during the later years. It ended the inaugural year with 18,000 customers, 30,000 by the end of 1998, 60,000 in 1999, 193,000 in 2000, 471,000 in 2001, 775,000 in 2002, 1.16 million in 2003, 2.4 million in 2004, 5.5 million in 2005, 11.3 million in 2006, and it ended 2007 with 16.5 million customers.

From the very beginning, Grameenphone placed emphasis on providing good after-sales services. In recent years, the focus has been to provide after-sales within a short distance from where the customers live. There are now more than 600 GP Service Desks across the country covering nearly all upazilas of 61 districts. In addition, there are 72 Grameenphone Centers in all the divisional cities and they remain open from 8am-7pm every day including all holidays.
GP has generated direct and indirect employment for a large number of people over the years. The company presently has more than 5,000 full and temporary employees. Another 100,000 people are directly dependent on Grameenphone for their livelihood, working for the Grameenphone dealers, retailers, scratch card outlets, suppliers, vendors, contractors and others.

In addition, the Village Phone Program, also started in 1997, provides a good income-earning opportunity to more than 210,000 mostly women Village Phone operators living in rural areas. The Village Phone Program is a unique initiative to provide universal access to telecommunications service in remote, rural areas. Administered by Grameen Telecom Corporation, it enables rural people who normally cannot afford to own a telephone to avail the service while providing the VP operators an opportunity to earn a living.

The Village Phone initiative was given the "GSM in the Community" award at the global GSM Congress held in Cannes, France in February 2000. Grameenphone was also adjudged the Best Joint Venture Enterprise of the Year at the Bangladesh Business Awards in 2002. Grameenphone was presented with the GSM Association's Global Mobile Award for ‘Best use of Mobile for Social and Economic Development' at the 3GSM World Congress held in Singapore, in October 2006, for its Community Information Center (CIC) project, and for its HealthLine Service project at the 3GSM World Congress held in Barcelona, Spain, in February 2007.

Grameenphone considers its employees to be one of its most important assets. GP has an extensive employee benefit scheme in place including Gratuity, Provident Fund, Group Insurance, Family Health Insurance, Transportation Facility, Day Care Centre, Children's Education Support, Higher Education Support for employees, in-house medical support and other initiatives.

Grameenphone Corporate Governance

In the fast-paced world of telecommunications, vibrant and dynamic Corporate Governance practices are an essential ingredient to success. Grameenphone believes in the continued improvement of corporate governance. This in turn has led the Company to commit considerable resources and implement internationally accepted Corporate Standards in its day-to-day operations.

Being a public limited company, the Board of Directors of Grameenphone have a pivotal role to play in meeting all stakeholders’ interests. The Board of Directors and the Management Team of Grameenphone are committed to maintaining effective Corporate Governance through a culture of accountability, transparency, well-understood policies and procedures. The Board of Directors and the Management Team also persevere to maintain compliance of all laws of Bangladesh and all internally documented regulations, policies and procedures.

Grameenphone is a truly transparent company that operates at the highest levels of integrity and accountability on a global standard.

Grameenphone Organogram

The shareholders of Grameenphone contribute their unique, in-depth experience in both telecommunications and development.

The international shareholder brings technological and business management expertise while the local shareholder provides a presence throughout Bangladesh and a deep understanding of its economy. Both are dedicated to Bangladesh and its struggle for economic progress and have a deep commitment to Grameenphone and its mission to provide affordable telephony to the entire population of Bangladesh.

About Telenor

Telenor is emerging as one of the fastest growing providers of mobile communications services worldwide with ownership interests in 12 mobile operators across Europe and Asia.
Telenor is organised into three business areas; Mobile operations covering 12 countries, and Fixed-line and Broadcast services covering the Nordic region.
Telenor holds 62 per cent of Grameenphone, with Grameen Telecom Corporation owning the remaining 38 per cent. Telenor has played a pioneering role in development of cellular communications in Bangladesh.

The Telenor Group

More than 150 million mobile subscribers worldwide

Strong subscription growth, particularly in our Asian operations

Listed as No.1 on Dow Jones Sustainability Index 2008

Ranked as the world's seventh largest mobile operator

Revenues 2007: NOK 105 billion

Workforce 2007: 35 800 man-years

Listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange, with headquarters in Norway

About Grameen Telecom

Grameen Telecom Corporation, which owns 38% of the shares of GrameenPhone, is a not-for-profit company and works in close collaboration with Grameen Bank.The internationally reputed bank for the poor, has the most extensive rural banking network and expertise in microfinance. It understands the economic needs of the rural population, in particular the women from the poorest households.

Grameen Telecom, with the help of Grameen Bank, administers the Village Phone Program, through which GrameenPhone provides its services to the fast growing rural customers. Grameen Telecom trains the operators, supplies them with handsets and handles all service-related issues.

Grameen Bank currently covers more than 67,000 villages which are serviced by 2121 bank branches all over the countryside. As of may 2006, the bank had 6.33 million borrowers, 97 percent of whom were women.

Grameen Telecom’s objectives are to provide easy access to GSM cellular services in rural Bangladesh, creating new opportunities for income generation through self- employment by providing villagers with access to modern information and communication based technologies.

Ensuring secured working environment is an integral part of responsible corporate behavior

Believing in the ethos of corporate social responsibility, Grameenphone always strives to uphold the standards in all its business operations. Ensuring secured work place is no exception. In order to minimize accidents at the workplace and at the project sites, GP regularly undertakes awareness programs as well as necessary training programs for GP employees and vendors/suppliers regarding various Health, Safety and Environment issues. Though the employees of our vendors are not directly employed by us, through our contractual agreement with the vendors, we aim to ensure safe and secured working condition for their employees when they are working for us. However, we are aware that this is a continuous process and there are always opportunities to raise the collective performance level with respect to health and safety standards.  Due to our scale of operations dispersed across the country while the local vendors/suppliers having low awareness on standard HSE practices, we consistently endeavor to address this issue through necessary phase-by-phase capacity building exercises.

Unfortunately some recent accidents occurring in our work place made us more concerned and alert to ensure that required standards are adhered to, especially by our vendors. On a few of these occasions, the victims, mostly employees of our vendors, regrettably succumbed to his/her injuries. Though safety measures were in place, while these accidents occurred, they had proved to be inadequate to prevent these accidents from happening. In these accidents, 3 vendor workers died falling to the ground from roof-top or tower while 2 other died due to electrocution while erecting billboard, 1 due to a fall into an acid tub in vendor’s factory premise, 1 from snake bite and another one from a heart attack while sleeping. On other occasions, a young girl died of electrocution from a wire in the fence of a storage area adjacent to a construction site while a 70-year old woman died as she was hit by a GP vehicle on Mymensingh highway.

In light of these recent unfortunate incidents, Grameenphone has commissioned a team having the Head of HSE as the team leader. The team will directly report to the CEO on the following immediate tasks which include:

1. Inspections at some factory premises to instantly show cause if any deviation is found from the standard or agreement.

2. Educate the vendors and suppliers on Health, Safety and Environmental (HSE) issues. The aim is to make the vendors and the suppliers capable enough by themselves to follow and practice HSE and corporate responsibilities in their daily activities. The focus will be targeted at the following areas:

a. Setup a more Comprehensive Guideline and enhance competence of the vendor on HSE compliance.
b. Benchmark setting on safe working condition including ILO and international best-practices and Standard Operation Procedure (SOP).
c. Regular audit of vendors/suppliers.

Telenor has extended its cooperation with Det Norske Veritas (DNV) as an advisor to perform mapping and review of HSE standards at relevant supplier in markets where Telenor has operations. DNV has already performed an independent assessment on working conditions and production standards at the relevant suppliers' facilities to provide necessary counsel to GP.

November 28, 1996

Grameenphone was offered a cellular license in Bangladesh by the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications

March 26, 1997

Grameenphone launched its service on the Independence Day of Bangladesh

November 5, 2006

After almost 10 years of operation, Grameenphone has over 10 million subscribers

September 20, 2007

Grameenphone announces 15 million subscribers.

Grameenphone is now the leading telecommunications service provider in the country with more than 20 million subscribers as of June 2008.
Presently, there are about 30 million telephone users in the country, of which, a little over one million are fixed-phone users and the rest mobile phone subscribers.
Starting its operations on March 26, 1997, the Independence Day of Bangladesh, Grameenphone has come a long way. It is a joint venture enterprise between Telenor (62%), the largest telecommunications service provider in Norway with mobile phone operations in 12 other countries, and Grameen Telecom Corporation (38%), a non-profit sister concern of the internationally acclaimed micro-credit pioneer Grameen Bank.
Over the years, Grameenphone has always been a pioneer in introducing new products and services in the local market. GP was the first company to introduce GSM technology in Bangladesh when it launched its services in March 1997.The technological know-how and managerial expertise of Telenor has been instrumental in setting up such an international standard mobile phone operation in Bangladesh. Being one of the pioneers in developing the GSM service in Europe, Telenor has also helped to transfer this knowledge to the local employees over the years.

Grameenphone Community Information Center

The Grameenphone Community Information Center is a shared premise where rural people may access a wide-range of state of art services such as Internet, voice communications, video conferencing and other information services.

Set up with technical assistance from the GSM Association, Grameenphone Community Information Centers (GPCICs) are equipped with the minimum of a computer, a printer, a scanner, a webcam and an EDGE-enabled modem, to access the Internet using Grameenphone’s nation-wide EDGE connectivity.

The pilot project started in February 2006 with 16 CICs; today the project has become a massive operation with over 500 CICs operational in nearly 450 Upzilla’s. The short-term plan of this initiative is to establish at least one CIC in each of the 462 Upazilla’s. In the long-run Grameenphone plans to increase the number of CICs substantially so that very CIC can support the information needs of four adjacent villages.

GPCICs are designed to be run independently as small businesses by local entrepreneurs. The entrepreneurs are trained and are provided with continuous support from Grameenphone. To help the entrepreneurs earn a living, Community Information Centers also provide other Grameenphone services, such as payphones (again using Grameenphone's mobile network) and electronic recharges (Flexi load) for prepaid and postpaid mobile accounts.
This initiative by Grameenphone is in line with the company’s objective to serve local community needs.
These include –

·    Bridging the “digital divide” by providing information access to rural people

·    Alleviating poverty

·    Educating the underserved and underprivileged on information-based services

·    Building local entrepreneurships and improving capacity

·    Creating employment opportunities for the unemployed youth

This initiative is part of Grameenphone’s drive to do something good for the rural community, which is a major portion of the population of the country.
CICs are a unique business model that has won appreciation from the International community, such as from the Washington Post, from UNDP, as well as the blessings of several International bodies like Katalyst and the GSMA.
The services available in the GPCICs include:

·    Internet surfing and e-mailing

·    Content on health, agriculture, etc.

·    Locally relevant customized and open content 

·    Chatting with Voice, Picture 

·    Video conferencing 

·    Typing

·    Scanning, Printing 

·    Commercial Mobile Call 

·    E-governance services 

·    GP value added services such as FlexiLoad, Ring tones downloading etc. 

·    E-Fax 

·    CD Writing 

·    Telemedicine services (to be introduced)

·    Multimedia education for children (Meena Cartoon, courtesy of UNDP)

In order to achieve its vision, Grameenphone has united with different organizations and institutions, in various categories, as strategic partners. The rollout partners of Grameenphone in this initiative are Grameen Telecom, Society for Economic and Basic Advancement (SEBA), and Eagle, nationwide, and Kalikapur Daridro Kallan Sangsta (KDKS), Socio-Economic Development Association (SEDA), Karmakutir, Goriber Asroy, and SSTD Communication, divisionally. All of these organizations are Non-Governmental Developmental organizations working with the rural populace for the development of the individual and the community.

Noakhali Web, an on-line newspaper for the greater Noakhali and Community Portal; and Anovatec, a Health Service Provider are also strategic partners of Grameenphone on the CIC project.

In addition, Grameenphone is working directly with international organizations like KATALYST and GSMA to make the initiative successful. Frequent programs and discussions are also held with UN bodies, such as UNDP, UNICEF and UNESCO, who share the common goal of making a significant contribution for the betterment of rural the mass.

This is an enormous endeavor undertaken by Grameenphone; and one that is possible to complete by Grameenphone alone. This is initiative that requires the cooperation and blessings of all governmental as well as other semi-governmental and private bodies and the support of the people from all sphere of life in Bangladesh.