Govt urged to renegotiate Afghanistan Transit Trade

ISLAMABAD (APP) - The engineering industry has proposed the government to renegotiate Afghanistan Transit Trade (ATT) agreement for the benefit of the local industry and growth of exports.
The suggestion was made at a meeting held here Monday at Engineering Development Board (EDB) in connection with National Engineering Exports Development Strategy (NEEDS), said a statement issued by EDB here.
The meeting endorsed to identify procedural issues in ATT and propose measures for formulizing trade with Afghanistan.
It was also recommended to undertake a collective marketing effort by involving commercial counselors and TDAP for marketing support including warehousing, brand development etc.
The banning of import of light commercial vehicle of right hand drive from Afghanistan was recommended.
It was noted that Afghanistan was a large potential market for engineering industry but the procedure, systems and processes were highly complicated.
A call to control cross border smuggling was also made.
Talking about Exports to Central Asian Republic, it was noted that there was hardly any exports due to no direct air, land and sea routes and lack of knowledge about these markets.
It was proposed that TDAP may develop regional specific export strategy for identified countries of CARs, Afghanistan, Iran and China.
Announcement of trade policy on medium term basis i.e. for 5 years was recommended, along with yearly corrections. Relevant notification to structure procedures, processes and system should be ready at the time of announcement.
Industry may be consulted throughout the year rather than once, it was said.
Government was also suggested to adopt due care while expanding annex G of import policy order regarding India as her medium and large engineering sector was more developed than Pakistan.
The meeting proposed to identify products being imported from India and allow only DTRE Scheme users to import from India and not the commercial transporters.