Sino-Bangladesh relations: Scopes and existing challenges

Bangladesh may make use of its increasingly improving relations with China in order to gain various non-traditional leverages coming out of Chinese economy

Friday’s visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Bangladesh was seen with enormous hopes and expectations from not just Bangladeshi side, but from China’s end as well. Chinese president’s decision to visit Bangladesh was no surprise considering its geographic location that would be handy for the economic purposes of China’s comparatively poor southwestern flank and also considering the pace of Bangladesh’s economy.

Bangladesh is among the top 10 fastest growing economies in the world (according to World Economic Forum & Investopedia), with an estimated growth rate of 6.6 by the end of 2016. Bangladesh is also thought to be among the 11 economies that are emerging faster following the footsteps of the BRICS economies. Eleven countries, including Bangladesh, were famously identified by Goldman Sachs investment bank as having a high potential of becoming, along with the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China & South Africa) countries, among the world's largest economies in the 21st century. These 11 countries, all with promising outlooks for investment and future growth, are famously addressed as the Next Eleven. 
Since Bangladesh’s economy is growing at a faster rate and also emerging in the global economic scenario loudly, the country needs support from big economic powers to serve the purpose of building up and shaping up an “organized” economic structure. In other words, with its economy taking off, Bangladesh needs few long-term economic partners to serve various ends of its economic improvement, including the buildup phase of its infrastructure and the attainment of heavy-industrialization. In this very crucial moment of Bangladesh’s urge for sustainable and consistent economic improvisation and heavy-industrialization, the recent approach from a friendly country like China came as blessings. Bangladesh should appreciate such approach and waste no opportunities that came with the recent deals between the two countries. Bangladesh should act sincerely regarding the signed projects in reciprocation of the friendly, sincere and mature gesture shown by China and also for the sake of its own economy.
The sparkling part of current China-Bangladesh episode was the upgradation of the relations to the “strategic” level. It is worth mentioning that back in 2010, the two countries agreed to develop a closer “comprehensive” partnership of cooperation. After Chinese president’s visit on last Friday, the relations are expected to take an upward trend as the Bangladesh and China announced to elevate the relations to a “strategic” partnership of cooperation during the visit.
Since the two countries reached the strategic level, it is very necessary to consider: (i) which direction should the partnership proceed in? (ii) how to carry on the partnership on a win-win basis? and (iii) how to resolve the existing challenges hastily?
Bangladesh may make use of its increasingly improving relations with China in order to gain various non-traditional leverages coming out of Chinese economy. Bangladesh and China have reciprocal interests with regard to industrialization. China wants to move away from its low-end products manufacturing trend to high-end products. China intends to build up the low-end industrialization capacities in other countries, helping the Chinese companies to “go global” as they set up factories in foreign soil. And heavy-industrialization is just the obsession that Bangladesh is craving for. Therefore, it seems China’s plan to build up the low-end industrialization capacities in other countries and Bangladesh’s desire for heavy-industrialization coincides with each other, making China and Bangladesh the ideal partners for each other in this regard. Hence, China may well be regarded as a desirable and reliable long-term partner for Bangladesh to achieve heavy-industrialization.
In addition to the heavy-industrialization issue, Bangladesh may focus on increasing its export to China. With the new strategic partnership in place, a new Bangladeshi “export” focus towards China (through increasing exports) would allow the Bangladeshi businesses to earn way too much higher profits than they make from the current exports to the Western countries.
Since the EU countries and the U.S. are far away from Bangladesh by distance and could only be reached from Bangladesh by ships via sea routes, it takes huge transportation costs to deliver the Bangladeshi export-products to those countries. Therefore, there are two problems with such transportation to the Western countries: (i) sea ways are the only route of transportation, and (ii) distanced destinations take huge transportation costs. On the other hand, the scenario with China is different. Because of shorter distance, the costs of transportation from Bangladeshi port to Chinese ports are way lesser than those of the EU countries and the U.S. Therefore, a new Bangladeshi export focus towards China (and perhaps ASEAN as well) would drive down the costs of transportation drastically, allowing the Bangladeshi businesses to earn way too much higher profits than they make from the current export to the Western countries. 
Moreover, the extra advantage that Bangladesh could exploit in this regard is that unlike the western countries, China can be reached by land route too from Bangladesh. Such land route, which is shorter in distance from sea route, could be used in order to export Bangladeshi products to China via Myanmar, a country which falls in between Bangladesh and China. In this regard, a route from China’s Kunming (Yunnan province) to Chittagong via Myanmar’s Mandalay could be constructed in order to facilitate such transportation of goods. The BCIM-EC (Bangladesh, China, India and Myanmar -Economic Corridor) route, if constructed, could have well served such purpose, benefitting not only Bangladesh and China, but also other relevant BCIM countries, namely India and Myanmar.
However, such export focus towards the East Asian country does not mean that the exports to the Western countries would be discredited. Exports to the West may run simultaneously with the export to the East, enabling Bangladesh to gain faster commercially and, thus, to reach the status of higher income economy in a very short period, and thereafter, reach the status of developed economy faster.
Bangladesh has an opportunity to work as a “sea-link facilitator” to the landlocked southwestern region of China that suffers from distant Chinese seaport links. China could export to, and import from, third countries by using the above mentioned route to reach Bangladeshi ports in order to load and unload goods to trucks and ships, which are meant to transport Chinese products to other third countries and vice versa.
China, as a whole, is actually different from how it is perceived across the world. The prosperous, wealthy and moneyed picture of China is actually the picture of the Eastern and Northern parts of China, where the cities like Beijing and Shanghai are situated. Beyond that the non-Mainland Chinese cities like Hong Kong and Macau are well known. However, there are other parts of China which are less developed and comparatively less fortunate.
There are proper transportation network system and huge investment in Eastern and Northern China, while the western and southwestern parts experience weaker transportation network system and thus experience isolation from the developed parts of the country. These isolated regions are far from all the Chinese seaports. Therefore, these areas are up for exploitation by the third countries having seaport access. While the western part is taken to be exploited by Central Asia and Pakistan vide the Belt and Road initiative, the opportunities in southwestern part is open for countries like Bangladesh and Myanmar.

    (To be concluded tomorrow)
The writer, primarily associated with law practice, is a law based researcher and an international affairs columnist. He teaches law at DCLE (centre of University of London)

Sino-Bangladesh relations: Scopes and existing challenges

Bangladesh may make use of its increasingly improving relations with China in order to gain various non-traditional leverages coming out of Chinese economy

Fridays visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Bangladesh was seen with enormous hopes and expectations from not just Bangladeshi side, but from Chinas end as well. Chinese presidents decision to visit Bangladesh was no surprise considering its geographic location that would be handy for the economic purposes of Chinas comparatively poor southwestern flank and also considering the pace of Bangladeshs economy. Bangladesh is among the top 10 fastest growing economies in the world (according to World Economic Forum Investopedia), with an estimated growth rate of 6.6 by the end of 2016. Bangladesh is also thought to be among the 11 economies that are emerging faster following the footsteps of the BRICS economies. Eleven countries, including Bangladesh, were famously identified by Goldman Sachs investment bank as having a high potential of becoming, along with the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China South Africa) countries, among the worlds largest economies in the 21st century. These 11 countries, all with promising outlooks for investment and future growth, are famously addressed as the Next Eleven. Since Bangladeshs economy is growing at a faster rate and also emerging in the global economic scenario loudly, the country needs support from big economic powers to serve the purpose of building up and shaping up an organized economic structure. In other words, with its economy taking off, Bangladesh needs few long-term economic partners to serve various ends of its economic improvement, including the buildup phase of its infrastructure and the attainment of heavy-industrialization. In this very crucial moment of Bangladeshs urge for sustainable and consistent economic improvisation and heavy-industrialization, the recent approach from a friendly country like China came as blessings. Bangladesh should appreciate such approach and waste no opportunities that came with the recent deals between the two countries. Bangladesh should act sincerely regarding the signed projects in reciprocation of the friendly, sincere and mature gesture shown by China and also for the sake of its own economy. The sparkling part of current China-Bangladesh episode was the upgradation of the relations to the strategic level. It is worth mentioning that back in 2010, the two countries agreed to develop a closer comprehensive partnership of cooperation. After Chinese presidents visit on last Friday, the relations are expected to take an upward trend as the Bangladesh and China announced to elevate the relations to a strategic partnership of cooperation during the visit. Since the two countries reached the strategic level, it is very necessary to consider: (i) which direction should the partnership proceed in? (ii) how to carry on the partnership on a win-win basis? and (iii) how to resolve the existing challenges hastily? Bangladesh may make use of its increasingly improving relations with China in order to gain various non-traditional leverages coming out of Chinese economy. Bangladesh and China have reciprocal interests with regard to industrialization. China wants to move away from its low-end products manufacturing trend to high-end products. China intends to build up the low-end industrialization capacities in other countries, helping the Chinese companies to go global as they set up factories in foreign soil. And heavy-industrialization is just the obsession that Bangladesh is craving for. Therefore, it seems Chinas plan to build up the low-end industrialization capacities in other countries and Bangladeshs desire for heavy-industrialization coincides with each other, making China and Bangladesh the ideal partners for each other in this regard. Hence, China may well be regarded as a desirable and reliable long-term partner for Bangladesh to achieve heavy-industrialization. In addition to the heavy-industrialization issue, Bangladesh may focus on increasing its export to China. With the new strategic partnership in place, a new Bangladeshi export focus towards China (through increasing exports) would allow the Bangladeshi businesses to earn way too much higher profits than they make from the current exports to the Western countries. Since the EU countries and the U.S. are far away from Bangladesh by distance and could only be reached from Bangladesh by ships via sea routes, it takes huge transportation costs to deliver the Bangladeshi export-products to those countries. Therefore, there are two problems with such transportation to the Western countries: (i) sea ways are the only route of transportation, and (ii) distanced destinations take huge transportation costs. On the other hand, the scenario with China is different. Because of shorter distance, the costs of transportation from Bangladeshi port to Chinese ports are way lesser than those of the EU countries and the U.S. Therefore, a new Bangladeshi export focus towards China (and perhaps ASEAN as well) would drive down the costs of transportation drastically, allowing the Bangladeshi businesses to earn way too much higher profits than they make from the current export to the Western countries. Moreover, the extra advantage that Bangladesh could exploit in this regard is that unlike the western countries, China can be reached by land route too from Bangladesh. Such land route, which is shorter in distance from sea route, could be used in order to export Bangladeshi products to China via Myanmar, a country which falls in between Bangladesh and China. In this regard, a route from Chinas Kunming (Yunnan province) to Chittagong via Myanmars Mandalay could be constructed in order to facilitate such transportation of goods. The BCIM-EC (Bangladesh, China, India and Myanmar -Economic Corridor) route, if constructed, could have well served such purpose, benefitting not only Bangladesh and China, but also other relevant BCIM countries, namely India and Myanmar. However, such export focus towards the East Asian country does not mean that the exports to the Western countries would be discredited. Exports to the West may run simultaneously with the export to the East, enabling Bangladesh to gain faster commercially and, thus, to reach the status of higher income economy in a very short period, and thereafter, reach the status of developed economy faster. Bangladesh has an opportunity to work as a sea-link facilitator to the landlocked southwestern region of China that suffers from distant Chinese seaport links. China could export to, and import from, third countries by using the above mentioned route to reach Bangladeshi ports in order to load and unload goods to trucks and ships, which are meant to transport Chinese products to other third countries and vice versa. China, as a whole, is actually different from how it is perceived across the world. The prosperous, wealthy and moneyed picture of China is actually the picture of the Eastern and Northern parts of China, where the cities like Beijing and Shanghai are situated. Beyond that the non-Mainland Chinese cities like Hong Kong and Macau are well known. However, there are other parts of China which are less developed and comparatively less fortunate. There are proper transportation network system and huge investment in Eastern and Northern China, while the western and southwestern parts experience weaker transportation network system and thus experience isolation from the developed parts of the country. These isolated regions are far from all the Chinese seaports. Therefore, these areas are up for exploitation by the third countries having seaport access. While the western part is taken to be exploited by Central Asia and Pakistan vide the Belt and Road initiative, the opportunities in southwestern part is open for countries like Bangladesh and Myanmar. (To be concluded tomorrow) The writer, primarily associated with law practice, is a law based researcher and an international affairs columnist. He teaches law at DCLE (centre of University of London)