Rajshahi missing investment due to poor infrastructure

Rajshahi fails to draw industrial investment despite having the potential due to poor communication infrastructure and lack of initiatives for the creation of entrepreneurs, analysts told a seminar in Rajshahi yesterday.

A scarcity of loan facilities is playing a key role in holding back the growth of business activities of the northwestern city, they said.

The district administration organised the seminar on “Investment prospects and possibilities in Rajshahi” on the Rajshahi Government College field marking the fourth National Development Fair.

The speakers demanded expansion of highways to reduce travel time to Dhaka and other distant districts, modernisation of the railway, turning the airport into an international one and reintroduction of riverine connectivity through capital dredging of the Padma river.

They also urged to declare Rajshahi as a special economic zone and take steps to disburse easy loans.

As the chief guest, Kazi M Aminul Islam, executive chairman of Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (Bida), called upon the city's youth to come up with new investment ideas.

He said the Bida would lobby the government and other authorities concerned for investing bank deposits locally and providing loans sans interests.

“The present government is eager to create entrepreneurs rather than jobseekers,” he said, adding that they would travel to villages to create trained manpower.

Aminul Islam, additional divisional commissioner, said only 4 percent of the country's total industrial investment was made in Rajshahi city, mainly for a lack of entrepreneurs and government facilities.

Md Moniruzzaman, president of the Rajshahi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, presented a 38-point proposal for drawing investment, saying good transportation facilities and loan and tax benefits could flourish garments and agriculture-based industries.

Prof Moazzem Hossain Khan of the economics department of Rajshahi University presented a keynote paper.