LCCI President Malik Tahir Javed, Senior Vice president Khawaja Khawar Rasheed and Vice President Zeshan Khalil stated here that country made a good economic progress in recent past but trade deficit and debts were posing challenges to the economy.

Mentioning a report, they said that trade deficit widened by US $ 12.13 billion in first four months of current fiscal year despite 10 percent growth in exports during the same period.

LCCI office-bearers said that issue of trade imbalance could only be tackled by enhancing exports and all other ways like imposition of Regulatory Duty were wastage of time. They added that Pakistan's most favorite export markets had been Europe, North America and Gulf, and the exporters needed to look for new markets in Central Asia and in South towards Africa, Indonesia and Malaysia.

They said that Central African Republics had on the whole round $ 70 billion imports whereas Pakistan's exports to them were negligible. Pakistan should particularly sign Free Trade Agreements with Central Asian Republics and the countries in Gulf, Indonesia and Malaysia, they said and added that Pakistani exports were also suffering due to high input cost and various taxes which must be resolved with due consultation of stakeholders.