Mamun Rashid

In today’s rapidly changing business environment, organisations that fail to adapt and evolve run the risk of becoming obsolete. As the management guru Peter Drucker said, “The only sustainable competitive advantage is an organisation’s ability to learn faster than the competition.”     

Earlier this month, I attended a graduation ceremony at Middlebury College at Vermont, USA. In her speech, the president of the college repeatedly mentioned the phrase “collective genius”, which has stuck with me since.

 Bangladesh is at a crossroads where the past meets the present and the future is forged.    

Bangladesh’s stock market had a lackluster year in 2022 after posting double-digit returns for the previous two years. Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSEX), the broad market index of the country, fell 8.1 per cent in 2022, while daily average turnover fell by 35 per cent.

Trade-based money laundering (TBML) is a silent killer that is undermining the very foundations of Bangladesh’s economic growth. As an emerging economy and, more so, an expanding trading nation that is going through LDC graduation, Bangladesh is particularly vulnerable to TBML. This illicit activity is weakening financial institutions, eroding foreign currency reserves, and undermining international trade, leaving the country’s economy in shambles and stakeholders in despair.

2023 is already here and no doubt, the last three years have been rough for Bangladesh. It is almost as though a ship at sea navigating and making its way through rough waters during a storm.

I am grateful to each of the seniors at ANZ, Standard Chartered, Citibank, and for the last eight years at PwC, for trusting me as an important client interface and solution-building person. Almost 35 years of client interface experience is all about what I am today.

In the post-pandemic, Bangladesh recovered reasonably quickly and was seeing encouraging signs that the economy was well poised to return to the pre-Covid growth path.

We have seen the year 2022 to be a year of many experiments for regulators, and more importantly, the local and international private sector.

The beginning of 2022 saw Bangladesh’s economy poised to make a strong recovery from Covid-19 with demand across the world rebounding, supply chain backlogs easing and improving domestic consumption.

As Bangladesh steps into its 51st year of Independence, one cannot help but applaud its inspiring story of growth. Bangladesh has transformed itself from an economic “basket case” into one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.    

The Bangladeshi startup ecosystem has seen remarkable growth in the past few years with approximately 1,200 active startups across sectors, including fintech, logistics, healthcare, tourism, agriculture and education. In fact, startups like ShopUp, bKash, Pathao, Chaldal, Maya, Shajgoj, and iFarmer have innovated new products and processes to transform the market and have attracted millions of dollars in foreign investments for Bangladesh along with creating thousands of new jobs.

Our professor for reputation and crisis management at Kellogg School of Management told us: “Nothing seems to work during a crisis. People are either confused or panicked all along.”

The turmoil in the banking sector is on the rise. A lack of good governance, rampant corruption, and political and managerial interference in management have led to this scenario. As the prices of daily commodities are on the rise, people are focusing less on new savings and on the contrary, using their prior savings to meet their daily needs.

When I attend a banking forum, junior bank executives often ask me: “What did I learn out of so many credit inspections across the world? How could we avoid loan losses?”

Our importers and institutions, those that need to remit various fees and surplus earnings outside the country, are facing challenges with foreign currency (FCY) payments for the last several months.

When I joined ANZ Grindlays Bank in the mid-eighties from a local bank, it was more to do with the social prestige the British legacy bank commanded in this part of the world. When I joined Standard Chartered in mid-1993, it was repositioning an erstwhile lousy bank. 

Bangladesh has made gradual progress in reducing some constraints on foreign direct investments (FDIs). However, many feel a lot needs to be done when it comes to improving the ease of doing business here.  

Hundi might be informal, but it is quite well-organised and more importantly, it is perceived to be much easier and more convenient in comparison to the formal banking system.  

The Bangladesh Bank capped the interest rate on loans at 9 per cent and on deposits at 6 per cent for banks, and 11 per cent on loans and 7 per cent on deposits for non-bank financial institutions.