LAHORE - Economic policies of the country should be revisited to bring diversity in exports instead of depending on single sector of textile by exploring new international non-conventional markets of Africa and other regions, as textile sector shares just $700 billion in total world trade of $91 trillion.
The representatives of industrial associations and trade bodies said that the government should now focus on exports of non-traditional items, in view of their huge potential. They said every sector should search new markets to increase exports as cost of production had increased due to the energy crisis and Pakistani products were no more competitive for European and American markets. APAT general secretary Naeem Mir said Pakistani industry could benefit from the EU market concessions only when it would produce in accordance with its potential. He said processing units could not be operated due to gas supply interrupted by outages.
The trade leaders said that jewellery, agricultural, dairy, livestock products and fisheries have great potential, as India exports gems and jewellery products of around $20 billion. He said agriculture sector figures were not available on TDAP website which exposed the negligent attitude of the government towards the sector of exports. According to him the government should improve the infrastructure in this regard so that dairy and livestock sector could play its due role to increase exports. He said that promotion of biotechnology was the need of the hour. He asked the government to raise trade fund which is just Rs.60 billion- a small amount as compared to regional countries.
He also asked the government to focus on promotion of regional trade for being more efficient in terms of cost and logistics, as the current regional trade consists of just 17 percent.
The inputs from the stakeholders would be more useful to develop a strategy of engagement with the regional countries which could benefit Pakistan’s economy, he maintained.
“No doubt, Pakistan can play a pivotal role in transforming the region into a trade and manufacturing hub but that requires sincere commitment on the part of our commercial attaches who should play an active role rather than doing their routine and formal jobs” he maintained.