Economic cooperation through Bimstec

Since Asian Development Bank is Bimstec’s development partner, the regional organization can harness its potentials of economic cooperation

Against the backdrop of a rather inactive Saarc, Bangladesh has rightly urged Bimstec member states to conclude the Bimstec Free Trade Area (FTA) negotiations as early as possible at the seventeenth session of the regional organisation’s Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM) held Tuesday in Nepal. The history of regional cooperation in this part of the world is not very colourful like that of the European Union. Economically speaking, nothing significant could be achieved by the countries of South Asia and South East Asia. 
When the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (Saarc) was founded in 1985 in Dhaka, it raised great hope among the member states that this would usher in a new era of mutual support particularly in the economic and cultural areas. But due to the rivalry between the two nuclear-armed nations among its members, India and Pakistan, the Saarc has failed to deliver on that promise. Through the forum Bimstec (the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) its member states could go a long way to help each other particularly in the economic sphere as Pakistan is excluded from this regional organization.
Not only in trade and investment, the member states of Bimstec, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand, can face together such problem as terrorism, transnational crime and climate change. In technological field also, the member states can help each other. In fact, at the foreign secretary-level meeting of Bimstec in Nepal, Bangladesh’s team positively focused on these issues. 
During the meeting in Nepal, participating members offered to hold to host workshops and conferences on different sectors. Bangladesh’s willingness to hold a workshop on Agenda 2030 to explore the interface between the Agenda 2030 and the Bimstec fourteen priority areas of cooperation in the second half of 2017, International Conference on Blue Economy in July 2017, 21st Meeting of the Bimstec Trade Negotiation Committee in March 2017 and Bimstec Tourism Ministers’ Roundtable in 2017 reflect that Bangladesh is very serious about the potentials of this regional organization. 
The other member states including Sri Lanka, India and Nepal also offered to host meetings on, among others, technology transfer and poverty alleviation, international conference on countering radicalization, security, joint exercise on disaster management, etc. But it should be pointed out here that on the possibility of free trade and investment, Bimstec achieved nothing significant as yet. Since Asian Development Bank is Bimstec’s development partner, the regional organization can harness its potentials of economic cooperation if the member states genuinely want to do so.   

 

Economic cooperation through Bimstec

Since Asian Development Bank is Bimstecs development partner, the regional organization can harness its potentials of economic cooperation

Against the backdrop of a rather inactive Saarc, Bangladesh has rightly urged Bimstec member states to conclude the Bimstec Free Trade Area (FTA) negotiations as early as possible at the seventeenth session of the regional organisations Senior Officials Meeting (SOM) held Tuesday in Nepal. The history of regional cooperation in this part of the world is not very colourful like that of the European Union. Economically speaking, nothing significant could be achieved by the countries of South Asia and South East Asia. When the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (Saarc) was founded in 1985 in Dhaka, it raised great hope among the member states that this would usher in a new era of mutual support particularly in the economic and cultural areas. But due to the rivalry between the two nuclear-armed nations among its members, India and Pakistan, the Saarc has failed to deliver on that promise. Through the forum Bimstec (the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) its member states could go a long way to help each other particularly in the economic sphere as Pakistan is excluded from this regional organization. Not only in trade and investment, the member states of Bimstec, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand, can face together such problem as terrorism, transnational crime and climate change. In technological field also, the member states can help each other. In fact, at the foreign secretary-level meeting of Bimstec in Nepal, Bangladeshs team positively focused on these issues. During the meeting in Nepal, participating members offered to hold to host workshops and conferences on different sectors. Bangladeshs willingness to hold a workshop on Agenda 2030 to explore the interface between the Agenda 2030 and the Bimstec fourteen priority areas of cooperation in the second half of 2017, International Conference on Blue Economy in July 2017, 21st Meeting of the Bimstec Trade Negotiation Committee in March 2017 and Bimstec Tourism Ministers Roundtable in 2017 reflect that Bangladesh is very serious about the potentials of this regional organization. The other member states including Sri Lanka, India and Nepal also offered to host meetings on, among others, technology transfer and poverty alleviation, international conference on countering radicalization, security, joint exercise on disaster management, etc. But it should be pointed out here that on the possibility of free trade and investment, Bimstec achieved nothing significant as yet. Since Asian Development Bank is Bimstecs development partner, the regional organization can harness its potentials of economic cooperation if the member states genuinely want to do so.