During the visit to the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and industry (FPCCI), Washma and her delegation thrashed out the declining volume of bilateral trade between the two countries that, they said, was engendered by various trade barriers and other bottlenecks. They said that impediments brought trade down to $1.5 million in 2015 and continued to show further decline in 2016.
Therefore, Afghan trade delegation stressed that bilateral trade between the two countries needed serious attention to avoid further decline. Former advisor to Prime Minister, Dr Mirza Ikhitar Baig, assured that FPCCI would take up this matter at the highest level and do its best to remove the bottlenecks in order to improve the existing bilateral trade relations. He also assured them that FPCCI would also play its role for expeditious clearance of Afghanistan-bound goods.
He vowed to ensure that substandard goods don't find their way in Afghanistan and maintain quality of products from Pakistan by making pre-shipment inspection of goods mandatory.
Vice president, FPCCI, Mirza Ishtiaq Baig said that bilateral trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan was showing positive trend. He said that efforts would be made to further improve it through more focus on Afghan Transit Trade and concentrating on road, railways, energy products, regional economic integration and economic co-operation.
He further said that FPCCI and its counterpart ACCI were the active members of SAARC Chambers of Commerce and Industry (CCI), ECO CCI and Islamic CCI and next year President-ship of the ECO CCI would go to Afghanistan. Therefore, he suggested that next ECO CCI might be hosted in Afghanistan and provides an opportunity to exploit potential of member countries.
They also discussed misuse of Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement by certain unscrupulous elements as the Afghanistan-bound goods arriving at the ports end up in the Pakistani markets and agreed that they must be subjected to thorough checking. Naig said that Government of Pakistan was aware of this situation and she increased the vigilance and planned to modernise scanning machines and tracking system at Pak-Afghan Border.
He assured the delegation of all-out needed co-operation that could help enhance the bilateral trade between the two brotherly countries.
Advisor of Afghanistan Ministry of Defence Washma Frogh proposed that FPCCI should explore the possibility of holding single country exhibition in Kabul and Kandahar and also send trade delegations for extension of trade and economic relations.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2017