Senate session: Upper House approves four trade bills

Legislation aims to protect the local industry from influence of cheaper products

ISLAMABAD: The government in a striking move revamped its trade laws on Tuesday, first in 25 years, aiming at strengthening trade defence against influx of cheap imports and to protect the local industry before liberalising trade with India.

The upper house of Parliament unanimously passed four Bills— The National Tariff Commission Bill 2015, The Anti-Dumping Duties Bill 2015, The Countervailing Duties Bill 2015 and the Safeguard Measure [Amendment] Bill 2015 (Ordinance No II of 2015).

Laws approved under The National Tariff Commission (NTC) aim to protect local industries against dumping of foreign products. The NTC Bill will provide a legal cover to the commission whose actions often come under legal scrutiny due to flaws in the existing law.

Congratulating the Senate on passing the bills, Minister for Commerce Engineer Khurram Dastgir said “trade defence laws of the country have entered 21st Century”.

Senator Farhatullah Babar, however, did not seem pleased as he blamed the prime minister converting 1,400 acre land of National Agricultural Research Centre [NARC] into residential/commercial plots.

Addressing the house over the issue raised by Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed of PML-Q, Babar did not mince words and blamed premier Nawaz Sharif for the decision.

Reading out from the summary sent by CDA chairman for the purpose he said that the “…initial decision was taken by the Prime Minister, the proposal be submitted to competent authority.”

Chairman Senate Raza Rabbani referred the matter to Senate Standing Committee on National Food and Research as per the demand of members, particularly the opposition.

He directed the committee to look into the terms and conditions of land lease and whether they were violated by NARC, and whether CDA is justified in taking land and using it for commercial purposes. He further asked the committee to check whether shifting NARC is justified and what the terms of agreement between CDA and private developers are.

Addressing the house, Senator Mushahid explained that former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had allocated the land to NARC in 1975 and since then CDA had not renewed the land lease and had suddenly come up with the idea of shifting the NARC.

He said that an amount of around Rs100 billion has been spent on the NARC land, which is playing a key role in improving agriculture and contributes 25 per cent to the country’s GDP.

Moreover, Khurram Dastgir read out a statement on behalf of Adviser to the Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs, in response to Senator Sehar Kamran’s statement, saying that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif wants resolution of all outstanding issues. “Kashmir tops the list and Pakistan will continue to extend political and moral support to Kashmiris,” he added.

Senator Kamran had said that during the recent meeting held between Nawaz Sharif and Narendra Modi at UFA, the issue of Kashmir was not raised and was not mentioned in the joint statement issued after the meeting, while India took up Mumbai attacks.