Star Business Report
A three-day e-commerce fair will kick off in Dhaka on September 25 to popularise online shopping and lure young generation to set up more e-trading companies in the country.
Computer Jagat, a leading ICT magazine in Bangladesh, will organise the exhibition for the sixth time at Begum Sufia Kamal National Public Library in the capital.
“Online shopping is getting popular in the country; but the amount of transaction is still very small,” said Md Abdul Wahed Tomal, convener of the Dhaka e-Commerce Fair 2014.
The fair is expected to increase such trading by building awareness, he said.
The number of e-commerce sites increased fivefold to 500 in the past two years.
Around 2,000 companies are doing business through Facebook, Tomal said at a press briefing at the National Press Club in the city yesterday.
Local e-commerce companies will showcase their products and services at the fair. Along with exhibition, publication programme of e-directory and gaming contest will also be organised.
Renowned ICT personalities and people related to the country's e-commerce industry will deliver key-note speeches in different seminars and workshops.
An awards night will also be organised where renowned ICT personalities will be honoured for their contributions to the sector.
Organisers will also hold around 20 seminars on e-commerce in public and private universities ahead of the fair.
No entrance and registration fee will be charged either to enter into the fair or to take part in the seminars.
The exhibition will also help in creating more entrepreneurs in the sector, said Mohammad Abdul Haque, assistant editor of Computer Jagat.
Many young people are becoming e-commerce entrepreneurs and earning their livelihood without doing regular “9 to 5” jobs, and many of these companies are getting success, he said.
The current decade will see the rise of e-commerce in Asian countries, said Razib Ahmed, editor of Ecombd, a Bangladeshi e-commerce blog. “By 2015, China's e-commerce market will be valued at $540 million; higher than that of USA.”
Online shopping accounts for a major share of daily retail trade in developed countries, and it is also growing in India and China, he said.
E-commerce has the potential to become one of the five leading sectors in Bangladesh in the next 10 years, he said.
“We need to work together to explore the potential Bangladesh has in e-commerce,” said Jubaer Hossain, senior manager for business development at SSL Wireless, an e-commerce solution provider.
He stressed the need for building customers' trust on online shopping.
In Bangladesh, online shopping, including e-ticket sales and sales through Facebook, has yearly transactions worth around Tk 200 crore, which is growing by nearly 30 percent every month, according to the industry insiders.
The first e-commerce fair was organised in the same venue in February 2013. The Daily Star is a media partner of this year's fair.
