By keeping used electric vehicles out for now, the government has chosen the harder but more sustainable path.
Picture a buyer shopping for her first car. Importers say a five-year-old Japanese electric hatchback could cost about half as much as a new one. The new car comes with a dealer, a warranty and a battery with a known history. The reconditioned one comes with a lower price and a question nobody in Bangladesh can yet answer with confidence: how much life is left in the battery beneath the floor?
The government has answered that question with caution — and rightly so. On 24 August, the Ministry of Commerce issued the Import Policy Order 2026-2029, which bars imports of used and reconditioned electric vehicles. An additional secretary at the ministry has explained that consultations with stakeholders found the country unready, pointing to thin charging networks, scarce battery-repair facilities and the absence of any policy for disposing of EV batteries. That is not hostility to electric mobility. It is an honest response to a reading of where Bangladesh stands today.
The Bangladesh Reconditioned Vehicles Importers and Dealers Association (BARVIDA) has pushed back hard. It proposes a conditional regime instead — vehicles no older than five years, batteries retaining at least 70 per cent of their original capacity, certified inspection before shipment, and no flood-, fire- or accident-damaged cars. On 17 September, some 1,300 member businesses shut their showrooms nationwide and suspended vehicle registrations and customs payments in protest.
The rhetoric has turned personal. A former BARVIDA president has accused importers of brand-new EVs of misleading policymakers. No public evidence yet supports that claim, and some of the loudest critics of used EVs have commercial stakes in new ones. Both sides have interests. Readers are better served by weighing arguments than by guessing at motives.
Proportion matters too. By BARVIDA’s own count, Bangladesh imported just 92 reconditioned EVs from Japan last year, and BRTA had registered only 669 electric cars of any kind by mid-May. The ban costs the market little today. What it protects is the foundation of the electric mobility system the country is trying to build.
The honest starting point is that a car’s age is a poor stand-in for what actually matters: the condition of its battery. Real-world data suggest modern batteries age slowly. Telematics firm Geotab, tracking more than 22,700 EVs, found average capacity loss of about 2.3 per cent a year. That rises to around 3 per cent for cars that depend heavily on high-power fast charging, and runs somewhat faster in hot climates. But averages hide wide variation. Two five-year-old cars with identical mileage can carry very different batteries.
On this point BARVIDA is right: condition matters more than the birth year. Yet its own threshold is weaker than it sounds. At average rates of wear, a five-year-old battery should retain close to 88 per cent of its capacity. A five-year-old car sitting at 70 per cent has aged like one twice as old. A 70 per cent floor would admit precisely the outliers buyers most need protection from. And any threshold is only as good as the testing behind it. As the head of one local EV manufacturer points out, Bangladesh currently has no independent way to verify a used battery’s age, condition or remaining life.
Defenders of reconditioned EVs make a circular-economy argument: building a battery is carbon-intensive, so keeping an existing vehicle on the road longer avoids those emissions. In principle, that is fair. Nor is Bangladesh’s fossil-heavy grid a reason to slow down; the International Council on Clean Transportation has found that electric cars already beat petrol cars on lifetime emissions even in coal-dependent India and China. Thus, the real question is not whether EVs are cleaner. It is — how the EVs are being managed.
Here the most relevant research strongly favours the government’s approach. A 2025 study in the Journal of Industrial Ecology followed used EVs shipped from the United States to Mexico. Exporting a typical vehicle raised its lifetime climate impact by 16 per cent and its non-cancer toxicity impact by 74 per cent, compared with keeping it in its original market. Worn batteries and weak recycling at the destination drove much of that increase. Used EVs did beat the petrol cars they replaced, but compared with a new EV driven locally, their climate advantage shrank to about 2 per cent, and their toxicity burden was slightly higher.
That finding goes to the heart of the matter. Bangladesh is not choosing between used EVs and petrol cars. Through this year’s budget, it is actively steering buyers towards new EVs. Against that alternative, a used import adds almost nothing for the climate and hands the country a spent battery sooner.
Handling that battery is where Bangladesh is weakest. Researchers from Australia’s CSIRO and the Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research report that the country has no formal lithium-ion recycling facilities, while informal recycling already harms public health. A widely cited review in Nature describes spent EV batteries as both a serious waste problem and a valuable source of critical minerals. Which one they become depends on institutions. Research commissioned by the UN Environment Programme projects that used-EV exports to poorer countries could exceed two million a year by 2035, and warns they may become a burden wherever repair and recycling capacity is missing. Bangladesh has seen this story before with ageing fossil-fuel imports; UNEP notes that in many developing countries, used vehicles account for more than nine-tenths of annual fleet growth.
Keeping used EVs out until the systems to test, collect and recycle their batteries exist is how Bangladesh avoids repeating that history with a more hazardous product.
Critics argue that the ban prices the middle class out of electric mobility. The concern is real, but the government has not ignored it. The 2026-27 budget cuts the total tax burden on electric cars priced up to $25,000 from 93 to 64 per cent, removes duties on imported chargers, and raises taxes on mid-range petrol and diesel cars to nearly 156 per cent. Price signals now point firmly towards new EVs. Some in the industry, including BYD’s local distributor, say the cuts favour pricier models. That is a case for refining the incentives, not for importing batteries of unknown health.
The government’s priorities also reflect where the public benefit lies. Private cars carry a small share of Bangladesh’s commuters, and the budget extends tax incentives for electric buses and trucks until 2030. That is the fairest place to spend fiscal effort. The stakes are enormous: the World Bank estimates that air pollution killed between 78,000 and 88,000 people in Bangladesh in 2019.
Why does Bangladesh’s context make caution the sustainable choice? In New Zealand or Britain, a regulated used-EV market can work, because inspection regimes, consumer law and recycling markets already exist. Bangladesh has none of these for EV batteries yet. Outside the big cities, trained EV technicians are scarce, and owners report difficulty finding genuine parts. A new car bought from an authorised dealer carries a warranty the buyer can enforce at home and a battery that can be traced. The protection attached to a used import depends entirely on who sold it.
Under these conditions, putting new EVs first is not protectionism. It is sound sequencing: build the capacity to verify and retire batteries before opening the door.
The policy is right, and the government can make it stronger by completing the system around it. First, it should publish the conditions under which used-EV imports might one day be reconsidered, which might turn the restriction into a clear standard for the industry to meet, and answers critics who call it arbitrary.
Second, when that day comes, the rules should certify batteries, not birthdays. That means accredited health testing before shipment, random retesting on arrival, and thresholds tied to age: closer to 85 per cent for a five-year-old car than 70 per cent.
Third, whoever sells a battery should answer for its end of life, whether the car is new or used. A BUET professor has suggested that importers bear lifecycle responsibility for the batteries they bring in. That principle should bind new-EV sellers too, because their batteries will also wear out. The European Union’s digital battery passport, which gives every pack a traceable record, offers such a model.
Fourth, the government can build on its budget with targeted affordability support: concessional green car loans, lower tax bands for small EVs, and continued priority for buses and three-wheelers. Finally, the government should publish its consultation records, watch for market concentration, and give reconditioned dealers a route to become certified sellers. Their workshops and networks are assets this transition will need.
In its latest climate pledge, the government has committed to making 30 per cent of passenger cars electric by 2035. Counting vehicles is the easy part. By putting new EVs first, the government has chosen to count only the vehicles it can stand behind. Every battery that enters the country will one day leave a car. The current policy ensures that, on that day, someone will be accountable for it.
The 88 per cent figure is the writer’s own estimate from Geotab’s average degradation rate; policy details come from press reports.
About Author:
Rafid Al Azwad
Executive, TBD