BGMEA President Mahmud Hasan Khan met with the Honorable Minister of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources, Iqbal Hasan Mahmud, MP, and Honorable Minister of State for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources, Anindya Islam Amit, MP, at the ministry with a request for cooperation in resolving the existing gas and electricity crisis in the industry and expanding renewable energy to continue production in the country’s ready-made garment industry. At that time, BGMEA 1st Vice President Selim Rahman and Vice President (Finance) Mizanur Rahman were with him. Energy Secretary Mohammad Saiful Islam was also present in the meeting.
In the meeting, BGMEA President Mahmud Hasan Khan said that although the confidence of buyers has returned after the elections, the international market has once again faced challenges due to the Middle East war. Especially since neighboring countries are ahead in energy security, the Bangladeshi garment industry is in a delicate situation due to the energy crisis caused by the war in the Middle East.
The BGMEA President said that due to the lack of gas and electricity as per the demand, the production capacity of the factories has decreased by 25-30 percent. He mentioned that production and product shipments are being severely disrupted due to the lack of sufficient diesel to run generators, especially in the Gazipur and Ashulia industrial areas, due to load shedding. Again, due to the increase in the price of raw materials and the cost of transporting goods due to the energy crisis, the overall production cost has also increased.
In this situation, the BGMEA delegation put forward some concrete proposals to deal with the crisis. Notable among these are:-
Emergency fuel supply: Ensuring rapid supply of diesel from filling stations under special arrangements to ready-made garment factories.
Gas Connection and Equal Distribution: Demands were made for providing emergency gas connections especially to small and medium industries (with boiler capacity of 300-500 kg) and for gas supply on an equal basis to all industrial areas surrounding Dhaka.
Infrastructure Development and Automation: Requests were made to install at least 2 additional FSRUs at the earliest and to facilitate the process of installing EVC meters in the industrial sector.
Reduction of Duties and Taxes: It was proposed to reduce production costs and reduce the government’s subsidy burden by withdrawing all types of taxes and VAT on imported fuel at the import and consumer levels.
The meeting gave special importance to renewable energy.
A request was made for special duty concessions on the import of solar PV system equipment in the garment industry to ensure environment-friendly industrialization. BGMEA proposed to reduce the existing high duty (from 28.73% to 61.80%) on essential equipment like solar panels, inverters, DC cables and BESS to 1%.
Minister and Hon’ble Minister of State listened to the proposals of the BGMEA delegation seriously, assured to take necessary steps to resolve the crisis considering the contribution of the readymade garment industry to the country’s economy and approved the format provided by BGMEA for supplying diesel from the nearest filling station on an emergency basis.
