The chairman of the Pakistan-Afghanistan Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Zubair Motiwala, has said that the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan should keenly follow-up the matter and develop long-term measures for ensuring overall economic stability in the region. He praised the efforts of Commerce Secretary Mohammad Younus Dagha, for streamlining economic policies and his constant engagement with private-sector stakeholders for effective implementation of the policies.
Motiwala said that Dagha has taken several initiatives to expedite resolution of the long-awaited matters and to further facilitate the business community in enhancement of exports and regional interactivity. Motiwala said that the recent political turmoil and frequent border closures with Afghanistan have hurt bilateral and transit trade, which is why Pakistan-Afghanistan trade has dropped significantly in the last few years.
Despite having the potential of $5 billion, bilateral trade has fallen from $2.5 billion to $1.6 billion because of tensions between the two countries that caused other countries to penetrate into Afghanistan easily, he said. He noted that India has recently acquired a strong hold on Afghanistan, both socially and economically, causing damage to the Pakistani economy and to the relationship between the two neighbours.
Additionally, the recent figures show a rise in Afghanistan's trade with Iran, including transit trade, and corresponding decline in business with Pakistan. He said that although Karachi is the most economical route for transit trade for Afghanistan, Iran's facilitating Afghan businessmen is drawing business away fro Pakistan. He said that only fiscal reforms and rationalizing of tariffs will curb the tendency towards parallel trade and enhance mainstream trade. That would not only improve the deteriorating trade balance of Pakistan with Afghanistan, but also help wipe off Pakistan's current account deficit.
He said that the Pakistan-Afghanistan Chamber aims to help revive and strengthen long-standing business ties between the two countries and said that meetings between their traders will play a big role in confidence-building measures across the border.
In the light of Motiwala's recent meetings with the ambassador of Afghanistan and the finance minister for better representation of the challenges faced by business communities across the border, he said that the commerce secretary can play a vital role in facilitating the process of joint discussions and especially facilitating the holding of meetings between the APTTCA and JEC.
He said that frequent border closures, heavy demurrages, extended waiting time, uncertainty and diversion of both bilateral and transit trade to other avenues is causing a rift and is resulting in long-run instability in relations with the prime neighbour of Pakistan.
He requested the commerce secretary to consider the appeal of PAJCCI for waiver of any applicable port charges (detention/demurrage) applied to Afghan consignments and containers accruing from the closure of the border, so as to limit the monetary losses of the business community. Turning to the issue of regulatory duties imposed on imports from Afghanistan, Motiwala requested for a waiver for the better connectivity among the tow neighbouring countries.
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