Bangladesh Bank Governor Ahsan H Mansur has urged the government to take firm action against large industrial groups that hold extensive government-leased lands in the shrimp sector but have failed to make the required investments. He said such non-performing leaseholders should be “kicked out” and replaced by serious entrepreneurs capable of reviving the struggling industry.
“We have a tendency to use tea gardens and fisheries estates as family jewels. No, they are national assets,” Dr Mansur said on 3 December while speaking at a policy dialogue titled “Transforming policy support for reviving Bangladesh’s shrimp sector” held at a city hotel. The event was organised by the Bangladesh Frozen Foods Exporters Association (BFFEA) and the Policy Research Institute (PRI).
Questioning the inaction over unproductive leases, he said, “The land was leased to big industrial groups; they didn’t invest. Why didn’t you take those lands back?” The governor called for a full census to assess land productivity and recommended cancelling leases held by non-investing groups.
Describing the condition of the shrimp sector as a “miserable failure,” Mansur highlighted the severe productivity gap noting that while India produces nearly 7 tonnes of shrimp per hectare, Bangladesh produces only 0.5 tonnes. He added that the industry’s export earnings have plunged from nearly $1 billion to around $300 million, which he attributed to “benign neglect,” particularly in adopting modern technologies such as high-yield Vannamei shrimp.
Dr Mansur also stressed that simply expanding credit will not solve the sector’s problems. The processing industry, he noted, already suffers from 12–20% underutilisation, while the core issue lies in insufficient production.
“The problem is not in the processing segment. It’s in the production segment. We do not produce enough shrimp to process,” he said.
He further reminded stakeholders that the central bank already provides “generous” loan rescheduling options with 10–15-year tenures and access to the Export Facilitation Pre-finance Fund, which allows exporters to secure up to Tk 5 crore for raw material imports.
