Timely wage payment first priority

Ensuring the timely payment of salaries and bonuses of the over four million garment workers is the first priority of SM Mannan (Kochi), whose panel swept elections to the executive committee of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA).

Candidates of the Kochi-led Sammilito Parishad panel won all 35 director posts at the BGMEA's biennial election for the 2024-26 tenure, held at the association's Dhaka and Chattogram offices on Saturday.

The elected directors are expected to nominate Kochi as the BGMEA president and select other vice-presidents on April 6.

Kochi talked with The Daily Star immediately after the results were announced at the Uttara office.

The payments were prioritised focusing the two upcoming Eid seasons as many factories, especially small and medium-scale ones, may face challenges for a rise in workers' wages since December last year.

Secondly, Kochi will try to resolve issues, including harassment allegations of factory owners and misunderstandings with tax officials pertaining to customs, bond facilities and regulations of the National Board of Revenue (NBR).

Sometimes business processes are delayed due to customs, bond and NBR offices taking up too much time processing documents and sometimes factory owners feel that they are being harassed, all of which need to be resolved, he said.

Harassment at the customs, bond and NBR offices need to be stopped, he said.

Kochi plans on resolving the problems by convening meetings and discussions among top officials of the NBR and businesspeople.

Bangladesh is set to make the United Nations status graduation from a least developed to a developing country in 2026 and at that time preferential trade benefits may erode for the garment industry.

In preparation of this, the government has already started to gradually reduce incentives on garment export receipts. However, cash incentives were partially reinstated after negotiations with the government.

Kochi plans on holding further talks with the government for reinstatement of all the incentives and their subsequent retention up to 2026 alongside on enabling alternatives for the post-graduation period.

Many countries like China and India have been paying cash incentives on export receipts under different names to bypass country status graduation-related bars to help their local industries gain competitiveness globally, he added.