BD, S Korea eye stronger infrastructure ties

Bangladesh and South Korea on Wednesday expressed keen interest in further strengthening collaboration in infrastructure development.

The Embassy of the Republic of Korea and the KOTRA Dhaka office organised the “Infrastructure Project Roadshow 2025” at the Amari Hotel for the sixth consecutive year.

Korean Exim Bank/EDCF is actively supporting infrastructure projects such as Road, Railway, Metro Rail, Power, Water and Sewerage, etc.

Expressing a high level of satisfaction for the high quality of work by Korean partners, stressed the high potential of cooperation between the two countries in developing Bangladesh's infrastructure.

Through all these initiatives, South Korea wants to build stronger ties with Bangladesh.

Some 13 government authorities and 35 Korean construction and engineering companies participated in the event.

Representatives of the Planning Commission, RHD, BBA, BPDB, DMTCL, DESCO, DPDC, DWASA, CWASA, PGCB, REB, RPCL, DMTCL from the Bangladesh side, and Samsung C&T, Hyundai E&C, Dohwa Engineering, Kolon Global, KECC, etc. from the Korean side participated.

Also, the country directors of Korea Exim Bank and KIND of Korea were present.

Jinhak Hur, Director General of KOTRA, in his welcoming speech, stressed the importance of infrastructure cooperation in developing close bilateral ties between the two countries.

The Planning Commission made a presentation on the project approval process, which was noted well by the Korean companies and other ODA organisations.

The planning approval process typically starts with a feasibility study and ends with administrative approval from the Planning Commission/ECNEC wing.

The presentation also highlighted ADP formulation, development planning systems in Bangladesh.

At the event, representatives from 12 authorities each presented their infrastructure project plans for the coming years, some of the projects might be of interest to the Korean ODA organisations as well.

Following the presentations, one one-on-one meetings were held between interested Korean companies and government authorities based on the results of the prior demand survey.

Korean companies have been long-standing partners of Bangladesh. In recent years, the bilateral relations witnessed remarkable developments in areas of cooperation beyond the RMG, particularly in infrastructure, said the Korean Embassy in Dhaka.

Korean companies are playing an important role in infrastructure development projects in Bangladesh through EPC (Engineering, Procurement and Construction) and engineering consultancy services worth over billions of dollars in the past few years, it said.

Also Korea is directly supporting through KIND (Korea Overseas Infrastructure Urban Development Corporation) initiated G to G PPP projects.