Although Bangladesh has made progress in a number of areas related to labour rights, the space for freedom of association and collective bargaining has been reduced in the country over the years.

Even child labour, including their involvement in hazardous jobs, is still pervasive across the country despite the progress, and the labour law does not take many international standards into consideration.

A coordinated and immediate approach involving commerce, employment and foreign affairs ministries would be required, particularly targeting to start G2G negotiations, seeking time and assistance to minimise the possibilities of facing any trade penalty, visa restrictions, sanctions or removal of preferential trade measures like Everything but Arms (EBA).

The observations came at a media briefing on ‘State of the Bangladesh Economy in FY2023-24’ organised by local think tank Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) at its Dhanmondi office in the capital on Saturday.

CPD executive director Dr Fahmida Khatun presented the keynote.

In the briefing, the CPD recommended fair trial by releasing RMG workers detained during wage protests, withdrawal of any deliberate cases filed specifically against protesting workers and providing compensation to the families of workers killed during unrest.

In the keynote, Fahmida said that the RMG industry has made remarkable progress in improving its safety status in recent times and child labour involved in the hazardous sector decreased compared to the past. The manpower of Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments (DIFE) has increased compared to the past and three new labour courts have been established.

Besides, the employment injury insurance scheme has been launched in Bangladesh on a pilot basis.

“However, the safety in non-RMG industry is still a concern and presence of forced labour and regressive laws is also worrying,” she said. “Instruct the industrial police not to create obstacles when workers stage protests against the violation of their rights and entitlements.”

Fahmida also recommended that the DIFE, with the collaboration of other stakeholders, should conduct a dedicated inspection over the next year, focusing particularly on industries like fish drying, brick production, garment manufacturing, and leather goods production with the objective of minimising instances of hazardous child labour and forced labour.

A huge gap in export repatriation

During the press briefing, CPD said that the country exported $359.21 billion worth of goods in last ten years, but $314.37 billion was repatriated. The remaining $44.84 billion is yet to be tracked down.

Besides, there is a big gap between the central bank and the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) export figure. The EPB announced that the country exported $55.6 billion worth of goods in the FY23, while the central bank said it was $43.4 billion.

“This high variance cannot be explained by discounts of cancellation of orders by the buyers,” Fahmida said.

“At a time of falling forex reserves, this trend is highly disquieting. Exports are exhibiting quite erratic behaviour,” she said, raising concern over the mismatch of export figure and huge difference between export earnings and repatriation.

The difference in the volume of export earnings arising from the conceptual distinction between Free on Board (FoB) value and Cost, insurance, and freight (CIF) value does not explain this large discrepancy between the two sources, the keynote paper reads.

According to EPB, RMG export earnings to the USA in the first 4 months of FY24 were negative 3.1 per cent compared to the corresponding period of FY23. In contrast, U.S import figures show a significant decline of negative 22.5 per cent.

EPB figures for the first four months of FY24 show an increase of 3.1 per cent in RMG earnings from the EU compared to the corresponding period of FY23. In contrast, the EU import figure shows a decline of negative 29.6 per cent.

CPD’s Distinguished Fellow Professor Mustafizur Rahman, Research Director Dr Khondaker Golam Moazzem, Senior Research Fellow Towfiqul Islam Khan, Research Fellow Muntaseer Kamal and Research Fellow Syed Yusuf Saadat were also present at the briefing.