No duty on PPE, hand sanitiser and testing kit raw materials
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) is set to remove all varieties of import duties and taxes to motivate quick import of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), recycleables found in hand sanitisers, coronavirus testing kits and re-agents, said finance ministry officials yesterday.
The list for duty-free import items also contains surgical masks and different sterilising agents.
An official notification may very well be issued today, said a senior official of the country's earnings authority seeking anonymity as he's unauthorised to speak to media.
About 17 items used to treat coronavirus patients and stem the rate of which the highly contagious pathogen spreads will be offered duty-free benefits to reduce import costs.
The move comes amid growing fears a full-blown COVID-19 outbreak will occur in the country that has a significantly less than ideal supply of coronavirus testing kits and PPE equipment such as gowns, surgical masks, goggles and hand sanitisers to tackle the problem.
Some of the items, for instance hand sanitisers, already are hard to come by as panic buying has left manufacturers struggling to handle the sudden surge popular.
With the general public scrambling to stockpile the merchandise, not only gets the retail price for hand sanitisers gone up, but the cost of recycleables used for manufacturing it has additionally risen.
Although the virus was first spotted in Wuhan, China in December last year, it has since spread around the world. By yesterday, the pandemic claimed the lives greater than 11,000 individuals worldwide.
Physicians and public health professionals in Bangladesh recently voiced concerns over the government's inadequate measures which have put the country at risk of a mass outbreak.
As of the other day, there have been about 2,000 coronavirus testing kits available in the united states. Yesterday though, the World Health Organisation had 10,000 testing kits shipped to Bangladesh from Singapore.
The initiative to remove import tariffs on equipment used for coronavirus testing and treatment was taken up to increase the option of such products, the NBR officials said.
The zero-duty import scheme is likely to continue for 90 days, they added.
