New committee of Ctg chamber pledges to accelerate investment

The newly-elected committee of the Chattogram Chamber of Commerce (CCCI) and Industry took charge on Wednesday with promises to contribute to accelerating investment in achieving the vision of making Bangladesh a developed country by 2041.

The new committee said they are united to facilitate protection and recovery efforts of the government for the trade and investment in Chattogram amid the COVID 19 pandemic, said a press release sent by the CCCI. 

The 24 directors of the CCCI have all been elected unopposed for the next two years in May this year. Of them, 13 are from the current committee. The remaining 11 are newly-elected chamber members.

"Skill development, creating employment opportunity through investment and survival and growth of CMSMEs during the post-pandemic period are the three key drivers to obtain the status of a developed country by 2041. My commitment is to facilitate our members and private sectors at large to grow their businesses and contribute to the national economy," said CCCI president Mahbubul Alam. 

The CCCI has taken many innovative steps to ease businesses under young leadership over the last two years. The new committee also set five goals, such as facilitating private sectors to create employment opportunities, helping the government in devising the right policies and regulations, ensuring proper safeguarding measures for private sectors, especially CMSMEs in Chattogram to survive during and after the pandemic, getting access to information and skilled manpower, helping the private sector to enhance trade and investment and branding Chattogram as the economic growth capital of Bangladesh and South Asia.

The newly-elected committee said in the press release, "With the cooperation and support of the business community in Chattogram, the new board envisages to march towards transforming Chattogram into the economic growth capital of Bangladesh and South Asia."

Tarafder Md Ruhul Amin, senior vice-president, said, "Bangladesh, especially Chattogram, is at the fulcrum of future trade and investment growth of Asia. I am fully committed to helping our businesses leverage the benefits of this extraordinary potential and transform Chattogram as the leading trade and investment destination of South Asia."

The immediate past committee of the century-old CCCI under some young leaders have taken some significant initiatives to support the government and the private sector in their effort to protect and promote trade and investment. Some of these major initiatives are the formation of the Bangladesh Centre of Excellence (BCE) for skill development, research and linkage for investment cooperation, arranging workshops and dialogues on policy advocacy and engagement between government and the private sector, sustainable family business, research and development conceptualisation. They have taken many programmes to strengthen relationships with foreign embassies to enhance bilateral cooperation for trade and investment.

The global economy is shifting to a new dimension with sustainability being its key mandate and with the advent of the 4th and 5th industrial revolution and the pandemic, businesses across the world need to transform quickly and Chattogram, as it is poised to be the future of Bangladesh economy, the need for Chattogram businesses to adapt to these changing business environments, is imperative. My responsibility is to help our fellow private sector businesses through introducing futuristic solutions for skills development and business transformation," Syed Mohammed Tanvir, vice-president of the CCCI.