KARACHI: Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President of Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum Mian Zahid Hussain has said that doing business in Pakistan is almost impossible and it has become like a gamble.

Now only those foreign investors who have no other option venture into Pakistan due to a host of reasons, he said, adding the target of the majority of foreign investors is not technological development or exports but local consumption.

He said that only those foreign investors will invest in big projects, who can get incredible returns like IPPs.

Mian Zahid Hussain said that investors who want to do business in Pakistan have to get dozens of permits and NOCs from the central government, provincial government and local government and they have to face unprecedented corruption at every step.

For this reason, foreign investment is eleven percent in Pakistan and if Chinese investors are not counted, it will remain only a few percent, while foreign investment in India is more than 29 percent and in China more than 35 percent of their GDP.

Foreign investors bring with them new ideas, new technology and modern processes while increasing the skills and productivity of the local population, but they are discouraged in every possible way, resulting in skyrocketing debt.

Mian Zahid said that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, Baloch separatists, the lawyers’ movement and the recent riots have caused irreparable damage to the country’s image and economy. Investors are not feeling safe in the current toxic political environment, economic downfall and increasing instability.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023