The Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industries (ICCI) has called upon the government to make a paradigm shift in its export strategy from western to Asian markets. “Pakistan’s traditional export markets including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Europe are still struggling to recover from the global economic recession due to which Pakistan’s trade volume with these countries is declining”, said Mahfooz Elahi, ICCI President, in a statement issued here on Wednesday.
Paradigm shift
He said that it was time that the government should make a paradigm shift in its export strategy for focusing on Asian markets, which offered unlimited opportunities for promoting trade and exports. Elahi said that in the coming years the fastest growing markets would be in the neighbourhood of Pakistan instead of distant Europe and North America. He said that foreign capital flows were also moving to surplus economies of Asia like China, Sri Lanka and India and it was an opportune time for the government to gear up its efforts to promote trade and exports with this region. He observed that trade volume with the US had been falling since 2008. Trade, both exports and imports, with the US in fiscal year 2008 were to the tune of $5.243 billion, which started falling to $4.7 billion in 2009 and $4.493 billion in 2010.
Substantial dividends
He further said that Asian markets were still untapped for Pakistan and added,” We can achieve substantial economic dividends by promoting business linkages with Asian countries”. The ICCI president was of the view that there were plenty of possibilities for mutual cooperation in the Asian region. However, to realise these objectives, all those barriers should be removed which held back Asian countries so far from capturing the extent of complementarities available in the region. He urged the government to accelerate efforts for promoting regional economic integration that would create new opportunities for the business community. He said that the government should adopt a strategy based on an understanding as to how Pakistan should enhance its trade share in emerging Asian economies.
ICCI stresses focus on Asian markets
