A Tk 420 crore project has been undertaken to acquire necessary land at Anowara in Chittagong for setting up the Chinese economic zone. The government has decided to spend from its development budget to realise the initiative as the implementing agency Bangladesh Economic Zone Authority (BEZA) lacks financial capacity to do the job as a new public entity, planning commission sources said. BEZA will now receive the whole cost of acquiring more than 774 acres of land from the government in the form of interest-free loan in the current fiscal year. The issue will be settled after the land acquisition project gets nod from the Ecnec meeting scheduled to be held this week. The second meeting of BEZA Governing Board, held in early February this year with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair, decided that necessary land will be acquired for Japanese and Chinese economic zones with ADP allocations as the money cannot be provided by BEZA or from government’s revenue budget, official sources said. The government is keen to setting up the Chinese Economic and Industrial Zone to lure Chinese investments after BEZA and Chinese commerce ministry signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) regarding this in line with the decision taken during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to China in early June 2014. Under the MoU, the government will lease out land to the Chinese government on a long-term basis and the Chinese government will select which companies will set up industries at the proposed zone.
