A total of 47 participants will put their products on display in the National Flower Exhibition 2005 at T&T ground in Sher-e-Bangla Nagar.

The show, which ends on January 7, will remain open to visitors from 10 am to 8pm.

"Flower is an emerging export commodity of Bangladesh. The fair will help local producers interact with potential foreign buyers," Mir Shahabuddin Mohammad, vice-chairman of Export Promotion Bureau (EPB), told a press briefing in Dhaka yesterday.

Referring to the recent trend of flower export, he said the country's earnings from flower export stood at Tk4.51 crore (US$0.77 million) in the last financial year and it is showing a tremendous growth this fiscal.

The income from flower export amounted to Tk4.09 crore ($0.69 million) in only first four months of the current financial year, the vice-chairman added, identifying India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, UAE, USA, UK, Italy, Portugal as prospective countries for flower exports.

There is a huge market for Bangladeshi flower in the EU countries, which was 3.5 billion euro in 2003, Shahabuddin said. It is possible to create more jobs by increasing flower export in the global market, he added.