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The government allows foreign workers here to take away 75 percent of their salary as remittance, he said.

“We have to have some programmes to produce skilled workforce in order to reduce such big amounts of money being remitted out every year,” Syeduzzaman said.

In Bangladesh, entrepreneurs are not being encouraged to go for manufacturing, said Farooq Ahmed, secretary general of the Bangladesh Employers Federation.

So, the entrepreneurs feel encouraged to go for trade-based businesses, he said.

“We need several labour-intensive sectors to generate more jobs. Incentives are paid discriminately and a few select sectors enjoy the government benefit,” said Rizwanul Islam, senior visiting fellow of the CDER and a distinguished fellow at the PRI.

Prof Shamsul Alam, senior secretary of the General Economics Division at the Planning Commission, urged district level technical training centres to play a vital role in producing skilled workforce.

Planning Minister MA Mannan said a 7-per cent economic growth over a period of eight to 10 years was impressive. “We will really be an economically developed country by 2040,” he said.