There is a growing impatience to return to “normalcy”, yet the continuous rise in active COVID-19 cases has made people in Bangladesh adapt to social distancing, which has further put the economy in a deep freeze. With the government planning to extend the ongoing lockdown to May 30 for averting the surge in coronavirus cases, the search is on for the balancing point.
It is now accepted that a lockdown is not the cure for the pandemic and may only bide some time which is currently being used intelligently to increase testing capacities and enhance health infrastructure in the country. Also, considering that a significant portion of the population is living hand-to-mouth, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina led government has permitted textile factories to restart their operations.
Taking after the examples in Sweden, China’s Wuhan (the epicentre of the virus) & Germany, Bangladesh has decided to open up its factories, however not without a slew of measures. We have to know our health risk but we must open our economy gradually by resuming work in RMG factories while also taking precautionary measures, said Salman F Rahman, Private Industry and Investment Adviser to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, at a recent discussion organized by the Federation of Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI).
This move is aimed at reviving the export-oriented industry, whose export earnings dropped by nearly 83 per cent to US$520.01 million in April from $3.03 billion in the same month of 2019 due to the spread of coronavirus globally. Meanwhile, it is not just about the increasing economic costs but also about the livelihood of millions of citizens who depend on thousands of these factories to earn a living and can’t afford to let go of it for such a long duration of time.
“We have to accept coronavirus as a part of life. If we don’t open factories, there will be an economic crisis,” said Mohammad Hatem, the vice president of Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association.
However, finding the right balance would be more essential to flatten the curve without pushing the economy to the brink. A more flexible method of extensive testing and isolating affected clusters would be more effective as it would help in resuming the economic life speedily, at least in the unaffected zones in Bangladesh.
