Experts have advised Bangladesh to enhance the capacities of the SME sector to guarantee a sustainable economy and surmount the obstacles once it leaves the Least Developed Country (LDC) category in 2026. Therefore, for the total growth of this sector, attention should be placed on technological advancement, finance availability, marketing facilities, research and innovation, product diversity, cluster basis, and infrastructure difficulties.
Business owners claimed that exporting leather goods involves numerous challenges, such as the absence of the proper paperwork and high-quality accessories that consumers throughout the world require.
“The industry will shape the future of smart Bangladesh in 2040, if we can prepare our CMSMEs (cottage, micro, small, and medium enterprises) with technological advancement, innovation, and know-how today with necessary policy guidelines and reform,” stated Md. Sameer Sattar, a former president of the DCCI.
He said it is high time to support the SMEs and make them digitally equipped to grab future opportunities. As a whole, 9 million SMEs with 24.5 million workforce in diverse sectors from agriculture, manufacturing, trade and services to export-oriented sectors are recognised as the lifeline of the economy of Bangladesh.
To encourage SMEs to become smart businesses, Sameer advocated for fiscal incentives like tax breaks and rebates, reasonable tariffs on innovation and technology, easy access to financing for SMEs, low-cost re-financing schemes for technology adoption, and technology transfer.
According to industry insiders, the SME sector is dealing with several issues, such as a lack of digital engagement, infrastructure, skills and capacity development, limited technology transfer, higher taxes, VAT, and tariff incidence for SMEs, a lack of laws and regulations about the conversion of SMEs into smart SMEs, limited uptake of 4IR technologies like cloud computing and artificial intelligence (AI), and a lack of awareness of internal tax management automation.
According to the SME Foundation, it has provided services to 20 lakh entrepreneurs and given training to 50,000 entrepreneurs. It arranged 11 national SME product fairs and 86 regional fairs in 50 districts. The foundation awarded 48 SME entrepreneurs to encourage them.
In addition to providing 3,108 entrepreneurs with Taka 300 crore as part of an incentive package during the COVID-19 epidemic, the foundation asked the government for another Taka 500 crore so that it could lend money to business owners.
According to data from the planning ministry, there are 7.9 million SMEs in Bangladesh. Among them, 6.4 per cent are medium-sized businesses and 93.6 per cent are tiny ones.
To create a “Smart Bangladesh,” the Government promised to raise the SME sector’s contribution from the present 25 per cent to 40 per cent by 2040. To ensure that the SDGs are accomplished by 2030, the UN has declared June 27 to be MSME Day.
Bharat Tex Special Report 2026 
