Consultant suggests easy start-up procedure

Thom Ruhe, middle, director for entrepreneurship of Kauffman Foundation, speaks at the monthly luncheon meeting of American Chamber of Commerce in Bangladesh (AmCham), at Dhaka Sheraton Hotel yesterday. From left: Khalid Hasan, AmCham vice president, Alexander Gazis, economic-commercial officer at the US Embassy in Dhaka; Aftab Ul Islam, president, and A Gafur, executive director of AmCham, are also seen. AmCham

The government should simplify business initiation procedures to woo more people into entrepreneurship, a US-based consultant suggested yesterday.
Criticising the government approach to inviting foreign direct investment (FDI), he said seeking more FDI with the prevalent complexities in setting up business is anomalous.
“Setting up business is one of the top priorities to take entrepreneurship and economic growth forward. It even helps recovery from recession,” said Thom Ruhe, director of Entrepreneurship for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, USA.
Ruhe was speaking at a luncheon meeting of the American Chamber of Commerce in Bangladesh (AmCham) at Dhaka Sheraton Hotel.
Ruhe said entrepreneurship is a key to achieving higher economic growth for countries such as Bangladesh. He said people here are said to be facing a series of complex procedural constraints causing delays in obtaining registration, new space and utilities connections for any proposed business.
He suggested adequate physical infrastructure, sound fiscal and economic policy, effective regulatory environment and easy access to capital and effective management of natural resources be made available to the entrepreneur-aspirants.
Citing successes achieved by Rwanda, he said the war-torn African nation managed to graduate to the 67th place from 143rd in the 2010 Doing Business ranking, which was mainly due to the contribution of the nation's entrepreneurs.
AmCham President Aftab Ul Islam chaired the meeting. Alexander Gazis, economic-commercial officer of the US Embassy in Dhaka, Khalid Hasan, vice president of AmCham, and A Gafur, executive director of AmCham, were also present.
Bangladesh ranked 119th in the global ranking of Doing Business 2010.
Aftab Ul Islam said whatever progress was achieved in Bangladesh, it was thanks to entrepreneurs.
Millions of people all over the country are engaged in doing something creative through realising innovative ways and ideas, he added.
The business leader said the future economic development of Bangladesh largely depends on the performance of these small and medium enterprises.
“They can work wonders for the Bangladesh economy and society.”
“This group of people deserves full state support and encouragement. Then the initial single project could become a major undertaking and can create job opportunities,” said Islam, also the chairman of the SME Foundation.