Pakistan with the potential to enhance its exports to Turkey up to $5billion needs to focus on streamlining free trade agreement (FTA) between the two countries, said the chairman of Businessmen Panel (BMP), Mian Anjum Nisar. Anjum said that Pakistan having great capacity in the trade of instruments, surgical appliances and agriculture products can significantly benefit once tariffs placed on Pakistan and other FTA partners of Turkey are brought at par.
Mentioning that tariffs imposed on top 10 high potential items of Pakistan are low (9.6 percent or below) yet there was a significant difference between tariffs placed on these goods imported by Turkey from other countries. "Turkey's FTA partners Egypt and Jordan enjoy tariffs significantly lower than those currently faced by Pakistan," said the BMP chairman. He reiterated that Pakistan must emphasize for tariff reduction on its high potential export products.
He opined that negotiations between the two countries need to focus on tariff elimination across high potential exports, particularly those in which the exporter has a comparative advantage. Secretary General (Federal) of the BMP, Ahmad Jawad said relations between Pakistan and Turkey were continuously growing in the spheres of economic, defence, culture besides at people-to-people level.
"We must work closely with Turkey to transform the close fraternal ties into a strategic partnership," he said reminding that trade between Turkey and Pakistan still needed special focus, as Turkey is gateway to Europe and can provide huge opportunities to the Pakistani exporters to market their products in EU countries. Jawad recalled that Turkey and Pakistan had finalized negotiations on free trade agreement and both counties wished to sign the deal at an earliest possible time last year.