Bangladesh is capable of extending trade benefits to the least developed countries (LDCs) after its graduation to a developing nation in 2026, Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh said today.

He spoke at a workshop on WTO Ministerial Conference (MC12) organised by the Economic Reporters' Forum (ERF) in Dhaka.

Under the LDC category, Bangladesh has been enjoying trade benefits from other developing and developed countries since its independence in 1971. But the country will have to extend the same trade benefit to other LDCs after its economic graduation.

Bangladesh's economy has grown in the last 50 years to a level on which the country has become capable of giving trade benefit to other LDCs, Ghosh said.

Now Bangladesh has been demanding different trade benefits from other countries but it will also have to give the same trade benefit to them, he said.

Bangladesh has this capability, he said citing the examples of the government's cooperation with Sri Lanka and Somalia recently.

Eight years are in the hand of Bangladesh to take preparations to compete after graduation, he added.

Moreover, it is expected that the WTO members will extend the LDC facility to the graduating countries for six or nine years more as the negotiation is underway, Ghosh said.

The government has been negotiating free trade agreements with different major trading partners to retain the duty benefit after the LDC graduation, he said.

By this time, the local exporters, especially the backward linkage industries of the garment sector, will be capable to supply raw materials from the local markets and will be capable to face duty in the European and the UK markets, Ghosh also said.