Export of agricultural products from Bangladesh fetched over $1billion in FY22.
In FY22, agricultural goods and relevant processed foods fetched $1.16 billion worth of foreign exchange, 13.04% year on year, Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) data showed.
The country’s overall merchandise exports were worth $52.08 billion in the past fiscal, recording a 34.38% growth year on year.
In FY21, the Bangladeshi agro-products had touched billion-dollar in export receipts for the first time in the country’s 50-year history.
In that fiscal, agro-exporters made shipments of agro-and relevant products worth $1.02 billion, EPD data also showed.
Analysts said that the entry of agricultural products into the billion-dollar-earner club has lit up a new hope for the country’s much-needed export-basket diversification, away from overdependence on readymade garments.
The apparel sector has been the single-largest export earner for Bangladesh for more than three decades, contributing around 80% to the aggregate export earnings.
It’s good news for the country that its businessmen are trying to diversify their exportable products in overseas markets, cutting dependence on the single-largest export item – RMG, analysts said.
They further said that light engineering, jute and jute goods, handicrafts, leather and leather products, some specialized textiles, ceramic products and glass and glassware were also doing well in export for the last couple of years.
According to the EPB, some ago-products like edible vegetables and certain root and tubers ($99.91 million), coffee, tea, meat and spices ($49.54 million), ginger, saffron, turmeric (curcuma)…curry and other spices ($39.66 million), sugar confectionery ($26.93 million), malt extract, food preparations of flour ($67.23 million), and fruit juices and vegetable juices ($58.20 million) performed well on the export market last year.
Besides, tobacco and tobacco products with $107.22 million in export earnings in the last fiscal also showed upward trends.
The largest ago-processing-product exporter Pran-RFL Group has already announced that it would double its export earnings to $1 billion by 2025.
It also plans to reach a $2 billion-revenue benchmark by 2030 based on its diversified range of products and markets.
The conglomerate’s export that started in 1997 by sending pineapples to France stood at $532 million in FY22, the company claimed. Higher volume of the Bangladeshi agro-products goes to the Middle-Eastern markets alongside some Asian, African and South-Asian countries.
