KARACHI: The Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum (PBIF) has urged authorities to review the trade pact with Iran as mutual trade between the two countries was claimed to have been reduced by 75% during the last six years. “The trade pact signed in 2006 with Iran has lost its efficacy and it’s high time that concrete measures are taken to boost bilateral trade equivalent to $5 billion in five years’ time,” said PBIF President Mian Zahid Hussain. “The two-way trade that stood at $1,321 million in 2008-9 presently stands as low as $43 million,” voiced another businessman. He further added that Iran’s trade with India, Turkey and China picked up during the same time, which was a matter of serious concern. Hussain said there was demand for Pakistani rice, services, agricultural products, meat, beef, pharmaceuticals, cotton yarn and chemicals in Iran and urged trade between the two countries to be facilitated and smuggling discouraged as it threatened local oil and gas companies as well as manufacturers.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 9th, 2015.
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