Bangladesh has offered Pakistani industrialists to join hands in increasing exports in apparel, pharmaceutical, information technology and light engineering. The offer was made by Chairman Board of Investment and Advisor to Bangladesh Prime Minister on Energy and Minerals Mahmood-ur-Rahman while addressing the FPCCI members on Thursday.
He said that by setting up joint ventures Bangladesh and Pakistan could easily compete with China and India in the WTO free-trade era. They can jointly grab a share of 30 billion dollars in $250 billion global textile trade.
Mahmood said that on the energy side Bangladesh was in better position than India and Pakistan, because it has gas reserves sufficient for 30 years and coal reserves for 200 years. "The consumption of gas in industries has grown by 41 percent and about 500 new industries were coming up every month in Bangladesh."
He said that being the least-developed country Bangladesh enjoys duty-free status in the EU market.
The Bangladeshi PM's advisor invited Pakistani businessmen to set up joint ventures in pharma, information technology and light engineering and acknowledged that Pakistan had made good progress in light engineering sector.
He said that Pakistani industrialists could set up cycle industry in Bangladesh for export to the EU on concessional duty.
The BD PM's advisor said that despite close relations and common history the trade between the two countries stands at only 2.5 percent of the intra-regional trade because of lack of communication, and suggested that every month there should be exchange of trade delegations.
"The two countries are engaged in international trade worth $50 billion but their bilateral trade amounts to only dollar 200 million."
Mahmood said that before leaving Dhaka he launched the world investment report which showed Pakistan at number one position by getting 74 percent increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) with Bangladesh being at Number two position be receiving 72 percent increase.
Earlier, FPCCI vice president Akbar Abdullah spoke about the interdependencies that existed between the economies of the two brotherly countries and the high trade potential between them.
The meeting was also addressed by Tariq Saeed and Iftikhar Malik. Deputy High Commissioner of Bangladesh Abdul Hannan was also present on the occasion.
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