Bangladesh has a vibrant Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector which can be divided into 33 subsectors of products and services. Available data shows that SMEs constitute 50.91 percent of the micro-economic sector, employs 35.41 percent of workers, and contributes 48.41 percent to Bangladesh’s GDP. Business support organizations (including sectoral business associations, chambers of commerce, and trade associations) are therefore influential in Bangladesh. Primarily representing large politically connected businesses, they have significant access to centers of power in Dhaka. Yet, information about their level of commitment to anti-corruption efforts remain limited.
This assessment report is part of an effort by the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) and its partner the Center for Governance Studies (CGS) to address this gap in information and examine the private sector’s commitment to anticorruption efforts. The assessment report, in addition to two surveys exploring the effects of corruption on household and SMEs, provides input on specific private sector led approaches that can be adopted to address enablers of corruption, as well as guidance for other outreach efforts to support private sector’s bottom-up demand for democratic governance in Bangladesh.
Published Date: August 03, 2022