Pakistan asks India to remove invisible trade barriers
Pakistan Times Business & Commerce Desk

KARACHI: The Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) has urged the Indian government to remove many-sided invisible trade barriers in order to facilitate the grant of MFN status to India by Pakistan.

President and leader of a KCCI trade delegation to India, Khalid Firoz, was speaking during a broad-based interactive meeting with the members of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) at their office in New Delhi.

"We should see eye to eye on accomplishing the desired objectives. We must accelerate the pace of economic and commercial activities in the region to avoid inflow of resources into other countries," Firoz said at the last leg of his visit to the neighbouring country.

The KCCI chief stressed that all efforts being made for bilateral trade promotion would prove abortive, unless credibility gap was bridged.

He regretted that the volume of trade between the two countries was not phenomenal and the balance of trade continuously remained against Pakistan.

The KCCI president disclosed that the Karachi Chamber’s second exhibition "My Karachi" would be held in June 2005 and invited the businessmen of India to participate in it. He informed that two countries - Sri Lanka and Bangladesh - had already consented to take part in the exhibition.

He said the Chamber was cognizant of the need for expanding the trade relations with foreign countries and had, therefore, signed 20 Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with them, including the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) during Expo 2005 held in Karachi recently.

"We must complement and not compete each other in the world market, especially in the field of textile," he urged.

Earlier, Deputy Secretary General CII S Sen, while welcoming the delegation, recalled his visit to Expo 2005, wherein he signed the MoU with the KCCI.

He stated that the economies of both countries were showing impressive growth and it was high time that the process of economic and commercial relations between the two countries was further activated.

S Sen extended invitation to Pakistani businessmen to participate in an exhibition being held in India under the aegis of CII.●