A high level 4-member delegation of Pakistan Furniture Council (PFC) left here on Wednesday for China to participate in three-day International China Import and Export Fair also known as the Canton Fair to explore new avenues of prospective investors by sharing vision, expertise for formulation of future policies, economic studies, sectoral and project specific reports besides promotional efforts.
These views were expressed by leader of the delegation Pakistan Furniture Council (PFC) Chief Executive Mian Kashif Ashfaq while talking to newsmen prior to his departure to China.
He said, "Despite imbalance volume of trade between Pakistan and China, economic and trade relations between Pakistan and China hold great potential and there is a dire need for Pakistani business community to focus on improving their competitiveness in the Chinese market besides taking full advantage of concessions granted by China under the China-Pakistan Free Trade Agreement (CPFTA)."
He said bilateral trade between Pakistan and China registered a ten percent ($4.4bn) increase in the first three months of this fiscal year as compared to the corresponding period in 2015 and unfortunately we are only using 3.3 percent of the total tariff lines. Pakistan could only export in 253 tariff lines out of the total 7550, where average export value was $500, he added.
Mian Kashif said Canton fair is currently the largest China's domestic international trade event, but also an important platform of enterprises to enter the international market, sharp ling measuring expanding foreign trade business in recent years, overseas to enhance the brand influence, an increasing number of global customers.
He said participation in Canton fair would help PFC to seek new opportunities to initiate the joint ventures with Chinese counterparts in furniture sector.
He said that there was a great demand of Pakistani furniture products abroad as its designs are unique besides popularity of properly processed high quality wood for its durability.