Chief Adviser’s Special Envoy on International Affairs Lutfey Siddiqi has credited exemplary teamwork and hard work for the achievement on trade front, noting that Bangladesh is now no worse off than any of its competitors as far as the US tariffs are concerned.
"Exemplary teamwork and sheer hard work by so many over several months, working ‘round the clock across time zones. What started as 37% is now down to 19% with additional benefits for selected items," he said, soon after the agreement on reciprocal tariff signed between Bangladesh and the United States.
However, the Special Envoy said they must keep focus and follow through on domestic economic reforms - crucially around ports and logistics, digitalisation of government services, banking sector governance, skills and education.
"As the rest of the world accelerate their reforms, failure to improve our performance on these factors will have a much more adverse impact on our competitiveness than tariffs," Siddiqi said.
The agreement on reciprocal tariff between Bangladesh and the United States was signed on Monday.
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On the Bangladesh side, the signatories were Commerce Adviser Sheikh Bashir Uddin and National Security Adviser Khalilur Rahman, and on US side Ambassador Jamieson Greer, US Trade Representative.
Negotiations on the agreement spanned over nine months since April last year, said the Chief Adviser’s press wing.
Ambassador Greer lauded Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus for his overarching leadership of the negotiations process and praised the Bangladesh negotiating team for its "incredible efforts." "This agreement will fit Bangladesh on US trade policy", he said.
After the signing, Commerce Adviser Sheikh Bashir Uddin, who led the Bangladesh side in negotiations, said that the agreement marked a historically new level in our bilateral economic and trade relations.
"It will provide substantially enhanced access of Bangladesh and the US to each other's respective markets", he said.
The US will further reduce reciprocal tariff to 19%, which was originally set at 37% and later reduced to 20% in August last year.
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In addition, the US committed to establishing a mechanism for certain textile and apparel goods from Bangladesh using US produced cotton and man-made fiber to receive zero reciprocal tariff in US market.
"The reduction of reciprocal tariff will grant further advantage to our exporters, while zero reciprocal tariff on specific textile and apparel exports from Bangladesh using US inputs will give substantial added impetus to our garments sector," said NSA Rahman who was Bangladesh's chief negotiator.
The agreement was approved by the Council of Advisers on Monday and will be operational once notifications are issued by the two sides.
Commerce Secretary of Bangladesh Mahbubur Rahman and Assistant US trade Representative Brendan Lynch were present at the signing ceremony.