Professor Md Mamun Habib, head of general management department under the School of Business and Entrepreneurship at Independent University, Bangladesh, has launched a research project report titled 鈥楧evelopment of Labour Conditions in Bangladesh for Sustainable Growth鈥�.
Professor Habib, involved in various industry-driven research projects such as USAID and BAFFA, was the lead researcher of the project, which was sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce in Bangladesh and supported by LRG Asset Management, said a press release.
Ikram Hasan, a PhD scholar at Unirazak, Malaysia, was the research assistant, while Syed Ershad Ahmed, president of AmCham and Forrest E Cookson, former president of AmCham, served as advisors.
The report was unveiled on Sunday at a hotel in Dhaka during AmCham鈥檚 May Luncheon event. Professor Habib, who has more than 250 research publications including Scopus and WoS indexed journals, delivered the keynote presentation and also moderated a panel discussion.
The panel featured Md Humayun Kabir, additional secretary, ministry of labour and employment, John Fay, commercial counsellor, Leena Khan, labour attach茅, US embassy, Dhaka, and Neeran Ramjuthan, programme manager, ILO labour administration and working conditions cluster.
The discussion was followed by a lively question-and-answer session with participants from organisations such as BGMEA, BKMEA, Dhaka Stock Exchange, various US companies in Bangladesh, and IUB. Dhaka University development studies supernumerary professor Atiur Rahman, also former governor of Bangladesh Bank, was the guest of honour at the event.
Key areas of discussion included the enforcement of labour laws, complexities in unionisation, the roles of government and international bodies in implementing labour laws, and the discrepancies in wage policies and worker demands. The research underscores the necessity of aligning Bangladesh鈥檚 laws with international standards to ensure sustainable growth.
