US urges Bangladesh to reform labour law by November

The US Trade Representative recently urged Bangladesh to undertake labour law reforms by November this year as per ILO recommendations and reduce the minimum percentage of workers' consent needed to form a factory trade union from 20 per cent.

It also requested the latter to update the intellectual property rights laws to prevent export of counterfeit goods.

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) recently urged Bangladesh to undertake labour law reforms by November this year as per the recommendations of the International Labour Organisation's (ILO) technical committee.
The US request for such reforms this year was not only for export processing zones, but for the law as a whole.

It also requested Bangladesh to update the intellectual property rights laws to prevent export of counterfeit goods.

Both sides had convened the seventh meeting of the United States-Bangladesh Trade and Investment Cooperation Forum Agreement (TICFA) council in Dhaka.

The meeting was co-chaired by Brendan Lynch, acting assistant USTR for South and Central Asia, and Tapan Kanti Ghosh, secretary in Bangladesh's commerce ministry, a press release from the US Embassy in Dhaka said.

The ILO's International Labour Conference will be held in November and that would be the perfect platform for Bangladesh to showcase the progress in its labour law reforms, said Ghosh.

The USTR wanted the minimum percentage of workers' consent needed to form a trade union in a factory to be brought down from 20 per cent.

However, it did not suggest any specific percentage like the European Union, which wants the threshold to be lowered to 10 per cent, said Ghosh.