Sajjad Zohir and Adeeb Choudhury

Submitted to: The Bangladesh Investment Climate Fund (BICF)

Companies Acts in several countries are going reforms; and the process in Bangladesh was being supported by the IFC. The opportunity to provide inputs on its sensitiveness to informal economy gave an opportunity to learn of the history, and the various dynamics arising out of interests pursued by different groups. It also gave an opportunity to look into the registration process and the unresolved domain of law and economics.

The Government of Bangladesh has initiated a reform of the existing 1994 Companies Act with the goal of drafting a comprehensive set of laws that are expected to capture the majority of the recent developments in the country’s private sector1. The Bangladesh Investment Climate Fund (BICF), managed by IFC, is supporting the drafting of the new Act by providing both legal and technical experts. In this context, the Economic Research Group (ERG) was approached for undertaking an analytical study on the possible impacts of provisions in the Companies Act on the informal economy. This report, prepared by Sajjad Zohir with substantive contribution from Adeeb Choudhury, is the result of the ERG initiative.