United States’ pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, which has been thought to affect Bangladesh trade, will have a little impact on Bangladesh as the new US president Donald Trump’s ‘protectionist’ economic agenda would hurt global economy including Bangladesh’s export, economists said. The US president signed an executive order on Monday ending the US’s participation in the TPP, a sweeping trade pact negotiated with eleven other nations. ‘Donald Trump has pulled the US out of the TPP, but there is no reason to be happy for Bangladesh as the initiative is the reflection of anti-trade position of the new president of the US,’ Policy Research Institute executive director Ahsan H Mansur told New Age on Tuesday. He said that the anti-trade position of the US president would hurt the world economy as well as Bangladesh. ‘Nobody should be happy with the Trump’s initiatives,’ Mansur said. Since the inauguration as president, Trump declared that he would take ‘America First’ policy while there are media reports that the new administration might impose sweeping import tariffs on all products. Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies senior research fellow Nazneen Ahmed said that it was deemed that the TPP deal would put a negative impact on competitiveness of Bangladeshi readymade garments in the US market. ‘Apparently, pulling the United States out of the TPP is positive for Bangladesh. But if we consider the trade policy of Trump in its entirety, there is no reason to be happy as the new US president has taken the move to protect and promote its (US) local industry,’ she said. Under the protectionist measure the US president would impose additional duty on exports to the US market and Bangladesh might lose its competitiveness in the market, Nazneen said. She said that in the new context Bangladesh should think how the trade would be negotiated with the US so that the new administration will impose lower duty on Bangladeshi products than it will impose on the products of the other competing countries. Promoted by Washington and signed by 12 countries in 2015, the TPP was neither ratified by American lawmakers nor was expected to pass a vote in the US Congress. The US, Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, Vietnam, Chile, Brunei, Singapore and New Zealand were the members of the recently formed TPP and they together represent 40 per cent of the world economy. After the pact was signed, economists and international lenders like International Monetary Fund said that Bangladesh would face huge competition in the US market, especially from the countries like Vietnam as it was supposed to get duty-free access. Anwar-ul-Alam Chowdhury Parvez, former president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, however, said that Bangladesh would be the beneficiary of the Trump’s decision for ending the US’s participation in the TPP. He said that Trump would obviously impose duty on imports but there was nothing to be worried for Bangladesh as the duty would be imposed on those countries which produce higher end products. ‘Bangladesh already pays duty up to 15 per cent on export to the US market and I think it (the rate) would not be increased further as we export basic items,’ Parvez said.
