Bangladesh requires a national strategy grounded in accurate data and cost-benefit analysis before graduation from the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), as this will impact future WTO negotiations, said experts from the civil society and journalists on Thursday (29 AUgust).
They said that data discrepancies, fueled by political ambitions, could weaken the negotiating power of the country in sectors like agriculture and fisheries.
These remarks came from a media workshop titled “WTO Trade Rules and LDC Graduation of Bangladesh” jointly organised by the Economic Reporters’ Forum (ERF) and EquityBD at the ERF auditorium.
Barkat Ullah Maruf of COAST Foundation presented the keynote at the event chaired by ERF president Refayet Ullah Mridha.
Hafizur Rahman, additional secretary and former DG of WTO Cell, Rezaul Karim Chowdhury, the chief moderator of EquityBD spoke, among others, at the event.
“We have the benefit of either side of LDC graduation. We will be benefited if we graduate and that will include the advancement of our competencies to openly compete with developed and developing countries,” said Hafizur Rahman.
He said that the country will also be benefited if delay its graduation for a few years and that will include the continued opportunities that the LDCs have.
“We have to choose either of those provisions,” Hafizur concluded.
Barkat Ullah Maruf said that Bangladesh must have a national strategy based on true data and benefit calculation before we go for the graduation from LDC which will ultimately impact negotiation in WTO in future.
He said that the country is facing data discrepancies derived from quick political ambition for which the economy is about to lose some negotiation ground in different sectors including agriculture and fisheries.
ERF president Refayet Ullah Mridha opined that Bangladesh should take the opportunity to delay the graduation for at least ten more years to review all the national data and get prepared to face the challenge.
The moderator of the session Abul Kashem, the general secretary of ERF, invited all of the present economic reporters to understand the WTO rules and create reports in their news media for the sake of Bangladesh’s development.
Rezaul Karim Chowdhury said EquityBD and COAST Foundation have been working on WTO since 2005 and demanded to form a separate WTO Cell under the Commerce Ministry to effectively monitor the WTO issues and build the country’s negotiation capacity.
