ICCB President Mahbubur Rahman has left Dhaka on October 29 (today) for Colombo for attending Asia Pacific Trade Facilitation Forum to be held, jointly organised by United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) and Asian Development Bank (ADB). He has been invited by UNESCAP and ADB to chair a session on E-Trade for SME Integration in Regional or Global Value Chains and to be a panelist at the High-Level Panel Discussion on “Enhancing Public-Private Collaboration for Trade Facilitation and Paperless Trade”. ICCB Secretary General, Ataur Rahman, has also been invited to attend the forum.

The forum will be attended by nearly 200 to 300 participants as in the previous years and will consist of government officials, traders, public and private service providers from Central Asia, South and South-East and East Asia as well as the South Pacific.

The forum, to be held in Colombo on October 30-31, includes sharing of experiences and knowledge on trade facilitation between countries of the greater Asia and Pacific region including LDCs and LLDCs, fostering increased understanding and exchange of views between public and private stakeholders along with trade facilitation standards developers and technical assistance providers, learning about and drawing lessons from on-going implementation of national and regional trade facilitation measures and introducing relevant international tools, instruments and facilities aimed at increasing the efficiency of regional and global cross-border trade using the latest tools invented by the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific.

ICCB President Mahbubur Rahman will return to Dhaka on November 1.