Half of 35 agencies yet to provide one-stop services through BIDA

Half of the 35 agencies are yet to provide one-stop services, widely known as OSS, through the Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) despite having agreements, said BIDA Executive Chairman Md Sirazul Islam.

Expressing his frustration, he said they should start providing services immediately.

Sirazul came up with the statement while launching five more one-stop services, at the BIDA office in the capital's Agargaon on Sunday.

With the new additions, the number of OSS' stood 56 – 18 are from BIDA's own and 38 from 17 other organisations.

The BIDA launched the OSS platform in early 2019, with an aim to bring all the agencies concerned under an umbrella to facilitate doing businesses in the country, providing all the required government and non-government services in a hassle-free manner.

"We would get extra courage if we had seen every agency providing services from the single platform," said Sirazul Islam.

The BIDA has so far inked memorandums of understanding with 35 agencies, mostly government organisations, but 17 are not providing services from the OSS platform yet.

Replying to queries of journalists,  Sirazul said, "We held a meeting with the agencies recently. Besides, we have a law named One-stop Service Act and a high-power committee led by the finance minister. We also requested the authorities to hold the committee's meeting soon."

"We would place the issues before the committee in the meeting and discuss A to Z there," he informed the reporters, saying that a strict decision should be made whether OSS would run or not.

"If OSS runs, everyone must provide services. Keeping individual agencies' separate online services at a time, OSS is meaningless."

An entrepreneur can get a unique identification number being registered with the BIDA and can get a wide range of services such as TIN registration and visa recommendation from a single platform. "We probably failed to make the service-providing agencies understand about the facility to make a better business environment."

The new services

The five new services are: third ad-hoc import registration certificate recommendation from the BIDA, issuance of income tax certificates to foreign citizens from the NBR, issuance of export registration certificates from the Office of the Chief Controller of Imports and Exports, issuance of trade licences from the Chattogram City Corporation, and issuance of the country of origin certificates from the Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industries.

The OSS

Like many countries around the world, Bangladesh enacted an act titled "One Stop Service Act 2017" to improve the investment facilitation services in the country.

Under the act, Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) has been empowered to implement OSS for investors.

The OSS under BIDA aims to serve as a single window and the only point of contact between the government and investors for investment-related services who are operating businesses outside economic zones.

Apart from the BIDA, four more organisations –Bangladesh Economic Zones Authority, Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority, Bangladesh Hi-Tech Park Authority, and Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation ­– are separately providing one-stop services to their targeted investors.

BIDA Executive Chairman Sirazul Islam said the government was also planning to blend the five OSS into one so that investors do not be confused. "I think it will help investors more," he added.

He said that they were now working to increase the services to 150 in number by next year.