Local freight forwarders against recruitment of foreign employees

The Bangladesh Freight Forwarders Association (BAFFA) has urged the authorities concerned to stop issuing permits to foreign employees to work in the local logistic and freight forwarding industry.

The association said the industry has developed its capacity in more than three decades with skilled manpower.

It does not need foreign employees any more, it added.

In a letter, dated February 20, the BAFFA had made the appeal to the Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA).

It suggested stopping issuance of permits to foreign employees to work in the local freight forwarding companies permanently.

The association also requested suspension of the work permits issued after January 29, 2017, and stop their renewal.

"Some companies are hiring foreign employees for top positions very tactfully from neighbouring countries and collecting work permits," BAFFA president Kabir Ahmed said in the letter.

"Many of them are working with tourist visa," he alleged.

Many return home before expiry of their visas and again join the workplace after renewal, Mr Ahmed alleged, saying that they do not feel the necessity of obtaining even work permits.

A few foreign firms here are running their regular activities by employing local people, it said.

Freight forwarding firms are providing export-import services which do not require any specialised technical expertise or technology transfer, BAFFA senior vice-president Amirrul Islam Chowdhury Mizan said.

The people working in the industry do need to have knowledge in the laws of the land, including export-import, foreign exchange and customs rules, he said.

Local people are well aware of these matters. If they are employed, money will not fly abroad, Mr Mizan mentioned.

When asked, BIDA executive chairman Md Sirazul Islam said they have received BAFFA's letter that requested for stopping issuance of work permits to foreign employees for their member companies.

"We are yet to take any decision as we need to scrutinise their pleas. We just can't stop issuing work permits following demands of one association while companies are seeking the same," he said.

Regarding the allegation of tax dodging by foreign employees, he said it is not BIDA's responsibility. The National Board of Revenue is responsible to find out who are not paying taxes.

The BAFFA has some 1,100 members who transport goods in international trade by sea, land and air or are involved in the combined multimodal transportation.

They also provide services like warehousing, packing, space booking, export and import documentation, customs brokerage, consolidation/deconsolidation, freight forwarding, logistics, non-vessel operating common carrier and supply chain management.

There is no specific data about how many foreign personnel are working in Bangladesh.

BIDA's industrial and commercial wings issue work permit to foreigners, but due to lack of expertise, available data does not show the real figure of current legal foreign employees.

The authorities have issued 7,642 new industrial work permits to foreigners in the past five years as of March 2018.

It has renewed such permits for 11,059 during the period.

The authorities have also issued some 5,500 new commercial work permits and renewed some 6,300 permits during the period in question.

In FY 2018-19, the BIDA issued 1829 new work permits to foreigners from some 75 countries while it allowed extension of permits for 3007 personnel.

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