Tanners look beyond US and EU for business

“We are now fully dependent on the US and the European Union countries for leather goods export. It will be risky for us if a recession or something like that occurs any time”, former President of Bangladesh Tanners’ Association (BTA) Mohammad Shahin said.

“We are now very serious about exploring new markets in different destinations”, Shahin said adding that they have already visited several countries and received positive response from them.

“We have invited buyers of those countries to visit Bangladeshi leather goods industries and compare our goods with those of other countries. Many of them have already made their visits to Bangladesh.”

Shahin also said, “In the meantime, we have received a good number of orders from the new destinations.”

Managing Director of Karim Leathers, Al-Haj Rezaul Karim Ansari has expressed his dismay that they have to pay a high tariff to export leather products to some new countries, which is a big barrier to the local exporters and he urged the authorities to negotiate with emerging markets to lower import duties.

He said, “We are now having discussions with many businessmen in China and Hong Kong and I am hopeful that we will be able to find a big market there.”

Ansari said, “China can be a big market for us but due to duty barriers so far our export remains insignificant. Recently, the barriers have been eased by Chinese authorities, so we are hopeful about making a good export to the new destination."

He said among the European Union (EU) countries, Germany alone has become a rising market for Bangladesh's leather goods in recent years, next to the largest market the USA.

Source: Financial Express, Bangladesh