Qureshi outlines economic diplomacy for socio-economic development

Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi Friday invited the foreign investors to take full advantage of exciting opportunities opening up in Pakistan and also outlined the government''s economic diplomacy for socio-economic development of the country.
Addressing an investment conference here, Qureshi said a key task of Pakistani diplomacy is to work for creating a peaceful external environment so that long-term developmental goals can be advanced in earnest. The ultimate goal is to deliver peace and prosperity, he added.
"In the context of Pakistan, economic diplomacy means 10 specific things leading to 10 specific agendas: enhancing Pakistan''s exports, and increasing our share in the international market, both in sectors of our comparative advantage and nascent fields, with promising prospects of growth," he said.
The others, he identified, are integrating manufacturing and industrial base into the global value chain by attracting FDI through greater ease of doing business and forging partnerships in strategic sectors of the economy, overcoming economic headwinds by helping create the fiscal space needed for long-term policy adjustments, working the lawful migration corridors by securing and expanding employment opportunities for Pakistanis abroad, and ensuring seamless inflow of remittances.
Prudently utilising official development assistance and donor support for national development to achieve Sustainable Development Goals, particularly to plug critical infrastructure gaps, in a manner that is environmentally and fiscally responsible is another agenda, he said, adding that prioritising technology and innovation by indigenising knowledge and ensuring technology transfers on favourable terms is also among the goals.
Besides, he also stated that the economic diplomacy of the government also focuses on promoting tourism as a foreign exchange earner, giving impetus to various projects on connectivity, from transit and multimodal transport, to energy or digital domains, working closely with other stakeholders on the counter terror financing track, to arrest terror funding and pre-empt threats to the financial systems.
He said last year in the envoys conference, they held extensive deliberations on the state of Pakistani trade and investments and what needed to be done.
He said the outcomes and recommendations of the envoys conference were presented to Prime Minister Imran Khan, which included to: adopt a whole-of-government approach, functionalise the one-window concept, address investor concerns, and expedite redress the trade complaints & disputes, devise country- and product-driven trade and investment strategies, plug the information deficit, involve the Pakistani Diaspora, and tap into the venture capital and sovereign wealth funds.
Sharing the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government''s achievements over the past nine months, he stated whether it is peace and reconciliation in Afghanistan or peace overtures to India, the country has been on the peace offensive.
In Afghanistan, he said a serious push towards dialogue has been made possible by the efforts by Pakistan, along with other stakeholders, as part of shared responsibility. "All the while, we have kept our allies and partners engaged and informed," he added.
While India has been raking up tensions with Pakistan, Qureshi said that as an outcome of the BJP government''s electoral arithmetic, Pakistan has managed to contain the crisis by acting with great responsibility, utmost restraint and iron resolve.
He asserted that the Kartarpur spirit, envisioned by Prime Minister Imran Khan, lends credence to hopes for a fresh push for dialogue and diplomacy, once a new government is in place in New Delhi.
Secondly, he said Pakistan has reinvigorated relations, imbuing them with a renewed spirit of cooperation and partnership. With China, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Turkey, Qatar, Malaysia and Iran, he said that Pakistan''s relations have assumed a stronger economic dimension.
During prime minister''s recent visit to China, Pakistan and China decided to enter the next phase of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which will see establishment of Special Economic Zones (SEZs). The SEZs are envisioned to be fulcrum of future waves of industrialisation with investments from China and Pakistan, he added.
He said China and Pakistan inked Phase-II of Pak-China FTA which gives Pakistan concessionary market access across a range of tariff lines, affords robust safeguard measures for protection of domestic Pakistani industry, and carries balance of payments support provisions.
"If Pakistan is able to capture even 10 percent of Chinese market share in priority products and lines, this would translate into a surge of our exports worth over $6 billion," he added.
Qureshi further said during the past nine months, Pakistan has secured, from friendly countries, balance of payments support to the tune of some $13.4 billion, which includes direct placement of funds with SBP, outright grants, trade concessions or oil on deferred payment facility.
He said big ticket investments are also lining up, adding that Saudi Arabia''s Aramco has committed $20 billion to set up an oil refinery in Gwadar and the UAE and Qatar are eyeing investments of a comparable magnitude.
During Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad''s recent visit to Pakistan, he told that contracts worth some $900 million were concluded.
He said Qatar has recently established visa centres to expedite uptake of 100,000 Pakistani workers and Bahrain is opening up a special nursing college in Islamabad, to enable Pakistani paramedics to capture the overseas demand.
Qureshi said during his recent visit to Japan, one of the major takeaways was an agreement recently concluded to train and up-skill Pakistani manpower, which is a first step towards granting greater employment opportunities of Pakistani human resource.
Furthermore, he pointed out Exxon Mobil''s return to exploration activities in Pakistan and the offshore drilling activity that is currently underway. He said that according to a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) assisted study, Pakistan has an estimated 95 trillion cubic feet of recoverable shale gas, and some 14 billion barrels of recoverable shale oil, making them among the largest in the world.
He said concerted efforts are being made to promote tourism, adding that visa issuance has been made easier and cheaper with the introduction of E-visa and visa on arrival facilities.
In partnership with relevant stakeholders, he said that economic diplomacy planning is being institutionalised. One area of particular focus has been science diplomacy, he said, adding that emphasis is being placed on creating linkages among counterpart institutions.
"If some of the most powerful and resourceful countries of the region are linking up with, and investing in the Pakistani economy, it is time to take full advantage of the exciting opportunities opening up in Pakistan," he asserted.