Dhaka to make updated list of goods for market access under WTO offer
Star Business Report
Dhaka will prepare an updated list of products for negotiations under WTO to get those included in the list of 97 percent goods eligible for duty-free and quota-free (DFQF) market access.At the 2005 World Trade Organisation Hong Kong meeting, the developed and developing countries agreed to provide the 97 percent products from least developed countries (LDCs) with DFQF facilities. A number of developed countries already gave DFQF facilities to the LDCs. But DFQF market access to the US market is extremely important for Bangladesh as US is the single largest market for Bangladeshi apparel products. The decision to prepare a new list of products was taken at a high-powered committee meeting yesterday with Finance and Commerce Adviser Mirza Azizul Islam in the chair. The meeting also decided to reconstitute its working groups dealing with WTO issues to make them proactive. "The existing working groups were not proactive. They should be proactive rather than reactive on the WTO issue," the adviser told a group of reporters after the meeting. The meeting decided to bring changes in the Trade Policy Review of Bangladesh as 22 countries questioned about complexity of tariff structure, over dependence on tariff and enhancement of revenue collection capacity.
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