Four ministries, one question: Alan Talib on bringing serious capital to Bangladesh
Published 19 October 2026 · 4 min read
Who was there
| Water Resources | Forhad Hossain Azad MP, State Minister of Water Resources |
| Agriculture | Md. Salim Khan, Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture |
| Railways | Habibur Rashid MP, State Minister for Railways |
| BEPZA | Major General Mohammad Moazzem Hossain, Executive Chairman, Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority |
| NordGulf Alliance | Alan Talib, CEO and Founder |
| Where and when | Dhaka, 7 to 15 October 2026 |
| Discussed | Investment incentives, bankability, reliable energy |
I thought I had four meetings in Dhaka that week. I had one.
The State Minister of Water Resources, the Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, the State Minister for Railways and the Executive Chairman of BEPZA each lead a different portfolio. Underneath, they share the same question: how do we bring serious capital in?
Bangladesh has a generous answer on the table. Land in its export zones, tax incentives, joint ventures, a young workforce and a government that genuinely wants partners. That opens the door. It does not bring investors through it.
What investors need to see
Capital does not follow need, and it does not follow incentives alone. It follows bankability. An investor commits when three things are clear: the return, the stability of the ground beneath the project, and a balanced deal in which both sides win. Put simply, they must be confident they will get their money back, and more.
In practice, that means a power purchase agreement that is honoured, payments that arrive on time, the ability to take earnings home in hard currency, and rules that do not change halfway through a twenty-year project. None of these cost a government land. All of them cost it discipline.
Energy first
And stability starts with energy. A factory on free land with unreliable power is not an opportunity. It is a risk.
When my family arrived in Norway in 1992, I assumed its wealth came from oil. It did not start there. It started with rivers turned into cheap, reliable power, and industry followed the power. Oil came later, and Norway managed it with the same discipline.
Gulf capital and Nordic technology are both looking closely at South Asia. The first question they ask is never how much land is on offer. It is how certain the return is.
The four portfolios make the point from four directions. Water and railways decide whether goods and people move reliably, agriculture decides whether a country can feed itself, and BEPZA runs the export zones where foreign companies set up. Each already has incentives in place. What turns them into investment is a return that investors can believe.
I have had this conversation from Oslo to the Gulf. The countries that attract lasting investment are not the ones that offer the most. They are the ones that make the return easiest to believe.
That is where I see Bangladesh's opportunity, and where I hope to contribute.
My thanks to Forhad Hossain Azad MP, Md. Salim Khan, Habibur Rashid MP and Major General Mohammad Moazzem Hossain for their time, candour and openness to partnership.
Incentives open doors. Bankability keeps them open.