Md Anisul Haque has recently been elected as the chairman of Social Islami Bank Ltd (SIBL).

The election took place at the bank's board meeting on Tuesday, the bank said in a statement recently.

Haque is a director of Hamdard (Waqf) Bangladesh and has also served SIBL as a founder director on behalf of Hamdard.

On the day, Sk Mohammad Rabban Ali and Sayedur Rahman were elected as vice-chairmen.

Also a founder director of SIBL, Ali is the managing director of Rabbani Trading Company Ltd, Shamlon Industries, Shama Poly Yarn Industries where Rahman is the managing director of Lodestar Fashions Ltd, Mid Asia Fashion Ltd and Jessore Fishery.

News: The Daily Star/Bangladesh/16-Nov-12

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) would provide $25 million in loan to Pran Group, one of the country’s largest foodstuff-manufacturing companies, for building three food plants.

The ADB Wednesday signed an agreement with PRAN Group to help the company build three food manufacturing plants, said a press release.

“The new plants will collect as much raw material as possible from local farmers, and thus will help boost agricultural growth,” Martin Lemoine, Investment Specialist of ADB’s Private Sector Operations Department said.

“The majority of Bangladesh’s poor still live in rural areas, and agriculture remains their main source of employment and income,” he added.

PRAN has set up Sylvan Agriculture Limited to build a liquid glucose plant in Olipur, 120 kilometers northeast of Dhaka, and a flour mill producing fortified flour and a frozen of food processing plants, both in Danga, 30 kilometers east of Dhaka.

The new plants are scheduled to complete by 2015. The three plants will cost $35.8 million to build. The rest of the fund will be provided by Chowdhury family, PRAN’s largest shareholders.

The plants will directly employ around 1,000 workers, and provide indirect employment for about 50,000 farmers who will supply maize and wheat to the plants under a contract farming model.

The management of Sylvan has committed to recruit at least 30 percent women workforce.

The investment, ADB’s first private sector agribusiness loan since 1985 and first private sector loan in Bangladesh since 2004, is part of its efforts to promote productivity and competitiveness in Bangladesh’s agriculture and food processing sectors.

The project will help boost country’s agribusiness sector, strengthen food value chain, increase food exports and improve food security and nutrition in Bangladesh. The project would play a crucial role in providing market linkages between farmers and food processing and export markets in the country.

Sylvan will have an annual production capacity of 45,000 tonnes of liquid glucose, 90,000 tonnes of flour and 180 million units of flour-based frozen foods and its annual sales is expected to exceed $50 million by 2016.

PRAN, with 29,000 employees, earns $450 million from sales including $70 million exports annually.

ADB, based in Manila, is dedicated to reducing poverty in Asia and the Pacific through inclusive economic growth, environmentally sustainable growth and regional integration.

Established in 1966, it is owned by 67 members – 48 from the region. In 2011, ADB approvals including co-financing totaled $21.7 billion.

News: The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/16-Nov-12

M. Farid Uddin, Managing Director of Rupali Bank Limited, inaugurates ‘Automation of Foreign Remittance System’ of the bank at the bank’s premises in Dhaka Thursday.

The state-owned Rupali Bank Limited has initiated Automation of Foreign Remittance System through web-based remittance software.

M. Farid Uddin, Managing Director of the Bank inaugurated 'Automation of Foreign Remittance System' in Dhaka Thursday, said a press release.

Remittance Department of the Bank organised the programme at the Bank's premises.

While speaking, managing director said the Bank was facing various problems due to absence of automation activities. From now on, customers can collect remittance from all branches of the Bank, he added.

News: The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/16-Nov-12

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) Wednesday signed an agreement to lend $25.1 million to Bangladesh's largest food manufacturer, the PRAN group, to help the firm build three food manufacturing plants.

"The new plants will source as much raw material as possible from local farmers, and this will help boost agricultural growth," said Martin Lemoine, Investment Specialist in ADB's Private Sector Operations Department. "The majority of Bangladesh's poor still live in rural areas, and agriculture remains their main source of employment and income."

PRAN has set up Sylvan Agriculture Limited to build a liquid glucose plant in Olipur, 120 kilometers northeast of Dhaka, and a flourmill producing fortified flour and a frozen food processing plant, both in Danga, 30 kilometers east of Dhaka. The new plants are scheduled for completion by 2015. The three plants will cost $35.8 million to build. The Chowdhury family, PRAN's controlling shareholders, will provide the balance.

The plants will directly employ around 1,000 workers, and provide indirect employment for about 50,000 farmers who will supply maize and wheat to the plants under a contract farming model. Sylvan has committed to ensuring at least 30% of its workforce is women.

The investment is ADB's first private sector agribusiness loan since 1985 and ADB's first private sector loan in Bangladesh since 2004. It is part of ADB's efforts to promote productivity and competitiveness in Bangladesh's agriculture and food processing sectors. The project will help push the country's agribusiness sector up the food value chain, increase food exports and improve food security and nutrition in Bangladesh. It is crucial to providing market linkages between farmers and food processing and export markets in the country.

Sylvan will have an annual production capacity of 45,000 tons of liquid glucose, 90,000 tons of flour and 180 million units of flour-based frozen foods. Annual sales are expected to exceed $50 million by 2016.

News: The Daily Financial Express/Bangladesh/15-Nov-12

The Bangladesh Bank (BB) has proposed a string of measures to the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to shore up the troubled state-owned commercial banks (SCBs).

Putting an end to the practice of sanctioning loans under pressure from powerful quarters and stopping the purchase of loans of questionable quality from private commercial banks (PCBs) -- are two major steps suggested by BB to help four SCBs to strengthen their financial base and overcome their image problem, a central banker said.

"Our suggestions to MoF to revive the status and image of four SCBs need special attention of the finance ministry officials as directives from them to senior bankers of state-owned banks matter most," a top BB official told the FE on Wednesday.

He said the BB is also serious about enforcing the measures, submitted to the ministry, in all four SCBs -- Sonali, Janata, Agrani and Rupali.

The proposals of central bank said the SCBs must bring an end to all fraudulent activities involving the sanctioning and disbursement of loans.

The BB in its proposals said the SCBs have to comply with the directives of BB on managing their loan portfolios and asset quality to avert any debacle in the future. The banks under no circumstances should exceed the approved limit of large non-funded loan and they must secure approval from their chief executive officers in the process of sanctioning large amount of non-funded loan. The banks also should undertake special drive to recover their huge classified loans, BB proposals said.

Furthermore, the proposals said without meeting the credit risk grading and due diligence no new loan should be sanctioned. Besides, the SCBs should fully comply with the conditions set in the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed with the BB and initiate special audit of its all branches, if needed.

The BB officials said the major problems lie with SCBs in granting loans being influenced by powerful quarters of the government ignoring the basic fundamentals and requirements in lending criteria.

"In many cases, we have to entertain requests or orders from top policy makers of the government in sanctioning bank loans to undeserving entities or individuals," a general manager of an SCBs told the FE.

"We are threatened with dire consequences like termination or transfer from powerful quarters in case we express inability to sanction loan or refuse to provide any unethical loan rescheduling facility," he added.

News: The Daily Financial Express/Bangladesh/15-Nov-12