Our expatriate workers

Over six million expatriate workers of our country contribute a whopping amount of around nine billion US dollar annually to the national exchequer. This amount constitutes the second highest foreign exchange earnings over any other sectoral export trade. Balance of payment, development expenditure, consumer-spending and the like are greatly stoked by this precious earnings. These workers are our unsung heroes.
But that is not the end of the whole episode. There is a flip side of it which is not very pleasant to hear and tell. Most of these workers belong to unskilled and non-professional category. Overwhelming majority of them are employed in middle eastern region and lesser number in Malaysia and South Korea.
They are engaged in "dirty, dangerous & demeaning" manual work in stringent working environment far away from their homeland and loved ones.
Although in our eastern value no work is considered demeaning yet it does not bode well for a self-respecting nation.
Now is the time to change course and reshape our policy-direction to extricate the nation from abysmal ignominy and ensure life with all its fruition to each of our fellow citizens.
Although it appears a tall order but is certainly not impossible.
I humbly propose the government structure and launch a mega self-employment credit programme tailored to suit the needs of every working man and woman all over rural Bangladesh.
The proposed credit shall be collateral free, production based, exceptionally easy but closely supervised and extended through all rural branches of both nationalised and private commercial banks with a must-do commitment. The fund involved here should be adequately bolstered by Bangladesh bank's refinance programme.
This apart, for existing overseas workers the government may float a fully subscribed and wholly owned banking institution exclusively meant for overseas workers along with a merchant bank as its subsidiary.
The bank should be run by a board comprised of committed and visionary leaders and manned by a team of high skilled professionals.
The merchant banking arm of the bank shall make calculated investment decision and manage the whole investment portfolio on behalf and as attorney of a willing worker-investor.
Meanwhile every single expatriate worker has to be informed to his overseas address in simple Bangla language without any technical jargon of the services the bank is ready to offer.
The above schemes, I firmly believe, will not only help create enormous employment opportunities but also unprecedented commercial activities throughout otherwise sleepy rural Bangladesh.