Rights groups for policy for e-commerce giants

Several rights groups on Thursday urged the government to develop an appropriate national policy to protect state assets and valuable information before signing any contract or agreement with profiteering e-commerce giants like Alibaba and Amazon.com.
They made the call from a human chain programme formed in front of the Jatiya Press Club in the city.
The human chain was formed by 30 rights organisations, including EquityBD, Jatio Sramik Jote, Landless Somiti and Apon.
Moderated by Mustafa Kamal Akanda of EquityBD, the human chain programme was also addressed by Syed Aminul Hoque of EquityBD, Abdul Kader Hajari, Executive Director of Apon, Nurul Amin of Jatio Sramik Jote and Subal Sraka of Landless Somiti.
In his speech, Abdul Kader Hajari said e-commerce is not for Bangladesh; rather it is followed in the rich countries like the USA, EU and China because they have developed hi-tech business.
"Our main goal should be to ensure sustainable development and reduce poverty. So, we need to create industrialisation and employment but the so called e-commerce process will hinder these development issues and increase poverty indeed," he added.
Nurul Amin said government is facing huge challenges to create employment whereas e-commerce will reverse it.
Mustafa Kamal said Bangladesh has a vision to reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development by 2030. "This will be impossible if e-commerce facilitates through profiteering MNCs is introduced."




He urged the government to protect the rights of the country's people through saving information and assets.    �UNB