n assessment of the impact of policies on industrialization in Bangladesh has been made within the framework of the theory of policy. The analysis includes four types of comparisons: “before and after” comparisons (using the NIP82 as a landmark policy reform); “with and without” comparisons (a counterfactual approach using macro data and micro-level panel data for over a decade); comparisons of targets and achievements (based on 5-year plans); and inter-country comparisons (with relevant neighboring countries). The objective variables include output growth, employment, investment, productivity, among others.

The findings reveal that industrial investment has decelerated; industrial output has stagnated; industrial productivity has fallen; and industrial sickness has increased. Technology gap against neighboring countries has widened. Inefficiencies have spread all around. Policies are, at best ineffective and, at worst, they have had negative impact on industrialization and overall national growth. One of the policy malice identified is unending and very high protection, especially through bans and tariffs instead of subsidies, which has created and is sustaining high-cost industries, leading to debilitating sickness. Denationalization without the accompanying competitive environment and a through prior analysis of the assets and liabilities, mode, extent, logistics, and a scrutiny of prospective entrepreneurs has failed to promote industrialization. Assignment of import permits and licenses of all kind on bases other than competitive entrepreneurialship of the auctioning type promoted rent-seeking and corruption, which, coupled with smuggling, inhibited industrial growth. Perpetual sustenance of depressed firms, public or private, has been inimical to industrialization. Above all, there has been neglect of technology (broadly defined), under the illusion that any talk of technology is a case for capital-intensive industrialization. A quantum increase in industrial R & D in Bangladesh is urgently needed to search for, import, and adapt similar technologies. In short, a policy implication of the findings is a redirection from over-reliance on fiscal and financial incentives to lowering real costs through technological incentives in Bangladesh.