Pak-China ties to promote regional trade integration

FTA between two sides has positive impact on Pakistan’s exports from all potential sectors

ISLAMABAD:

Bilateral economic cooperation between China and Pakistan would go a long way in promoting regional and global trade integration, said Adviser to Prime Minister on Commerce and Investment Abdul Razak Dawood.

Talking to APP on Tuesday, he said that both the countries had already strengthened cooperation in various fields of economy, particularly in trade and investment for mutual benefit and advantage of the whole region.

Dawood said that during the last 10 months (July-April), Pakistan’s exports to China increased by 31% to $1.951 billion from $1.491 billion in the corresponding period of last year.

“CPFTA-II has a very positive impact on Pakistan’s exports in all potential sectors, which indicates that it is going in the right direction, for which the credit goes to the exporters,” the adviser added.

He said that the CPFTA-II had brought down tariffs to zero for Pakistan on 313 high-priority tariff lines, which benefited the country as almost half of Pakistani exports to China were covered in these lines.

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However, he was of the view that the list of Pakistani products exported to China was long in length but short on value.

In recent years, the bilateral trade volume between China and Pakistan has increased rapidly with a stable commodity structure, though the balance is much in favour of China.

On the other hand, the Chinese investment in the country has grown over the period of time in different sectors of the economy.

“Over the last decade, we have seen Chinese investment in Pakistan grow as large Chinese state-owned companies and private sector enterprises have invested in areas such as oil exploration and production, power generation, textiles, etc,” Pakistan-China Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCJCCI) President SM Naveed told APP.

“There is great potential to be tapped in China-Pakistan economic cooperation, particularly keeping in view the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC),” he added.

With the initiation of CPEC, there has been a surge in investment flows into Pakistan, especially in infrastructure and energy sector.

Naveed said that China had been encouraging its companies to invest and do business in Pakistan and the PCJCCI was playing an important role in this regard.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 19^th, 2021.

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