"As free trade brings competition, the authorities in the countries like Bangladesh should provide flexible economic policies and good regulatory framework to help the companies in strengthening competitive edge," he said in an exclusive interview with The Daily Star yesterday.

To face the challenges of globalisation the president of IOE suggested more integration of the developing countries with world economy. More integration with world economy would help generate employment and boost economic growth, he said.

Underscoring the need for free flow of products, Perigot, now in Dhaka to attend the 6th Asia Pacific High Level Employers' Conference that began on Monday, said these countries should also try to remove various trade barriers to others.

On the issue of increasing the flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) in countries like Bangladesh, Perigot laid emphasis on good economic activities. "If the condition of a country is good it would attract FDI".

Attractive business conditions, existence of a sound market and a good legal environment are the other pre-conditions for attracting foreign direct investment, the IOE chief said responding to a question about the possible role of his organisation in attracting FDI in Bangladesh.

He stressed the need for an active role of local employers' organisation for attracting FDI and assured all sort of assistance from his organisation for Bangladesh. The IOE can provide assistance to develop skill in manufacturing companies, he pointed out.

He also said a company should create employment and the trade unions in private and public sectors should protect the workers from any maltreatment.

In this context, he said, as the ILO fixes the standard of social norms all parties should respect the standard formulated by the ILO.

The unions should also work to improve the condition of the workers. The IOE also tries to maintain work standard in accordance with ILO convention. It contributes to fixing social standard of workers in its member countries, he said.

The 6th Asia-Pacific high level conference ends today with adoption of a set of recommendations.

The recommendations and major deliberations of the conference will be taken into consideration while negotiating with governments and other international bodies.

Representatives from 21 Asia-Pacific countries are participating in the conference.

The first such conference was held in Tokyo. The conference mainly deals with social problems and other related issues in the member states. A total of 120 countries in the world are members of the IOE.