The Asian Development Bank, in its Quarterly Economic Update March 2007 for Bangladesh, recommended that the Asian country develop its infrastructure, namely the transport and power sectors, to stabilize economic growth and maintain an attractive foreign investment climate. “The country is facing an enormous challenge to improve the capacity of the Dhaka-Chittagong transport corridor to meet the demands of accelerating traffic,” the ADB said, referring to the corridor that facilitates 80 percent of the country’s external trade, connecting it to neighboring Myanmar, Thailand, India, Bhutan and Nepal. “Because of its strategic location, this corridor can play a significant role in the sub-regional transportation system by providing direct and shorter transport links by rail, water, and road,” the report stated. At present, the transport systems between the capital and the port city are congested due to insufficient capacity and poor logistics, which the ADB estimated to be costing the country “20 percent of its foreign trade potential and reducing potential gross domestic products by 1 percent.” (Source: ADB says Bangladesh needs to improve infrastructure/Reuters)
