ICB okays 39 venture capital projects to boost farming, IT

Sheikh Shahariar Zaman

The Investment Corporation of Bangladesh (ICB) has approved 39 'innovative' projects from the government's venture capital facility to boost new entrepreneurship in the country's agriculture and information technology sectors.

The projects which include software development, data entry and hatcheries were the first to be approved by the state-owned merchant bank after it was entrusted with the management of the Tk 3.00 billion Equity and Entrepreneurship Fund (EEF) since the beginning of the current fiscal year.

The corporation sorted 3,000 applications since it took over the management of the fund and then short-listed 2,126 projects in agriculture and 19 in IT, said Mohammad Iftikhar-uz-zaman, general manager of ICB.

"Among the short-listed ones, we have approved 25 agriculture projects and 14 in IT sector since February this year," he said, adding the authorities hoped the new projects would boost employment and spur innovation in the country's two key sectors

The approved projects would get about Tk 720 million funds from the facility, Mr Iftikhar said adding, "The entrepreneurs will have to invest 51 per cent of the project cost."

The EEF is the Bangladesh government's first venture capital facility set up in 2004-5 fiscal year with an initial fund of Tk2.00 billion for investing in "risky yet rewarding" projects in the country's fast-growing agriculture and IT sectors.

The Bangladesh Bank was made the first manager of the fund. As a manager, the BB approved 216 projects until June last year. But its selections of some projects came under flak, prompting the government to hand over the management to the ICB.

In June, the ICB had 150 IT project applications and it short-listed 44 of them but none of them submitted their project proposals, Iftikhar said adding, "We have selected another 19 projects from which 14 submitted PP and got approval."

The rest of the short-listed companies can submit their project proposals any time and the corporation will accept it for final approval, he said.

The corporation has a target to okay at least 20 projects every month to help new entrepreneurs who find it tough to get supports from banks for their projects, he added.