Focus on non-traditional exports: Senate body wants government to give more incentives to exporters

Senate Standing Committee on Commerce on Friday urged the government to focus on increasing non-traditional exports, calling for simplifying procedures and providing more incentives to exporters.
The committee met at the Parliament House under the Chairmanship of Senator Muhammad Amin Dadabhoy to discuss the contours of the export policy, like gems and precious stones, seafood, handicrafts, herbal health supplements, horticulture to promote floriculture exports, which have a big market in addition to pharmaceuticals, furniture, minerals etc, said a statement issued here on Friday.
It was observed that export diversification was necessary to achieve the country's export target. The committee expressed satisfaction that the country's exports increased from 17 billion dollars in 2006-07 to 19.22 billion dollars in 2007-08 registering a growth of 13.23 percent.
Some members of the committee observed that "on the one hand, we are keen to increase and expand exports, but on the other, the cost of doing business is increasing rapidly due to high interest rates and ever increasing prices of gas and electricity."
They urged the government to overcome this apparent dilemma by innovative policies. Earlier, the Commerce Secretary informed committee that Pakistan's export achieved a growth of 13.2 percent during 2007-08, crossing 19 billion dollars.
For the current year, a target of 22.1 billion dollars has been set, ie a growth of 15 percent despite unfavourable international economic situation, the government is confident to achieve the target by not only enhancing competitiveness and productivity, but also diversification of products and markets. He said that to reduce cost of manufacturing and to make our exports more competitive, it is proposed that plant, machinery and equipment, imported to set up a unit in DTRE scheme, would be exempt from duty and taxes.
This will reduce the cost of investment and encourage investment of exports and generate employment and inputs in DTRE would also be allowed to be imported from India, even if these were not included in the importable items form India, or manufactured locally.
The government, he said, was also committed to provide "zero rating" to exports by refunding of indirect taxes on input cost incurred on manufacturing of merchandise, which is exported and a study would be conducted jointly by the Federal Bureau of Revenue (FBR) and the Ministry of Commerce to quantify the extent of refund, which would become due on this account.
The Senators expressed the confidence that Pakistani businessmen and exporters had the potential to overcome the expectations of the people and the government, provided they were given the right kind of incentives, duly supported and governed by conducive policies.