30 Bangladeshi officials to receive higher education at Japanese universities

The signing ceremony of “the Project for Human Resource Development Scholarship (JDS)” was held at Economic Relations Division (ERD) of Ministry of Finance on Tuesday.

H.E.Mr. Masato Watanabe, Ambassador of Japan to Bangladesh, and Mr. Kazi Shofiqul Azam, Secretary of ERD signed the Exchange of Notes representing respective governments. Mr. Takatoshi Nishikata, Chief Representative of JICA Bangladesh Office, also attended the ceremony and signed the Grant Agreement for the project, according to a press release.

Since 2002 to date, 298 Bangladeshi officials have studied in Japan under the JDS scheme. In light of the strong expectation of the Bangladesh Government to enlarge the scheme, the Government of Japan has increased the annual number of Bangladesh JDS awardees significantly during the past few years: the yearly intake of 15 which stayed constant between 2010 and 2014 has doubled to 30 by last year, making Bangladesh the second biggest among the 13 JDS participant countries.

In addition, the Government of Japan has just decided to open up the JDS scheme for Ph.D candidates from this fiscal year. This year’s 30 JDS fellows will train themselves in different graduate schools in Japan to pursue such desciplines as public administration, economic affairs, legal system and urban planning, public finance and investment policy, it added.

It is expected that JDS fellows would play an active roles after the completion of the programme in drawing up and implementing social and economic development policies. It is also expected that JDS fellows would make valuable contribution to furthering mutual understanding and deepen and broaden friendship between Japan and Bangladesh.