Prime Minister inaugurates garments export fair BATEXPO

Prime minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the annual three-day expo, hosted by Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, at Sonargaon Hotel.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has urged garment owners, manufacturers and workers to work together to protect the garment sector from the conspiracy, report agencies.

"Garment owners and workers have to maintain good relations. You have to look into the advantage and disadvantages of each others. The government is always ready to provide you all necessary support," she said Thursday.

Inaugurating this year's Bangladesh Textile Exposition (Batexpo-2013), the PM also assured the garment owners of considering their demands for reducing the Fee on Board (FOB), bank interest rate and provide tax facility for the industries in new garment village in Munshiganj.

Hasina said her government has started to set up garment village on 531 acres of land at Baushia in Munshiganj and the plots will be handed over to the entrepreneurs in phases.

She said newly constituted wage board for wage hike of the garment workers is working. She expressed the hope that the wage board will be able to announce a wage structure soon to be acceptable to both the owners and workers.

She also said usually the wage board for workers are constituted in every five years. But the government has constituted new wage board in only three years to provide more facilities to the garment workers.

Minister for Textiles and Jute Abdul Latif Siddiqui, LGRD and Cooperatives Minister Syed Ashraful Islam, Commerce Minister Ghulam Mohammad Qader, Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister Faruk Khan, Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan attended the function as the special guests at a city hotel.

BGMEA president and chairman of Batexpo organising committee Atiqul Islam, second vice president of BGMEA MA Mannan Kochi and acting first vice president of BGMEA Abdul Wahab, spoke, among others, on the occasion.

The PM also distributed Frontier Award and Young Entrepreneurs Awards among BGMEA members for their success in different categories including business promotion, compliance and promotion of women entrepreneurship.

She also handed over awards to different individuals for performing their corporate social responsibility (CSR) and service for development of the garment sector and welfare of the workers.

The Batexpo, organised by Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), gives the buyers, investors, partners and visitors from home and abroad the opportunity to have an idea about wide range of apparels and textiles produced by Bangladesh and provides atmosphere to local manufacturers to build lasting trade relations with international buyers.

The PM said a vested quarter is out to create obstacle on development of women. In many pleas they want to disrupt the progress of the garment sector. The government, workers and owners of the industries should remain united to foil their evil design and enhance productivity.