LAHORE: Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has called upon foreign diplomats to help grant maximum market access on favorable terms to Pakistan so that Pakistani businesses could create jobs and opportunities for people to be hopeful.
According to LCCI spokesman here Wednesday, the Lahore Chamber's office-bearers expressed these views while speaking at Annual Goodwill Dinner hosted by the LCCI at Islamabad in honour of Foreign Ambassadors in Pakistan.
The LCCI office-bearer, he added, had also urged the diplomats that Pakistan wanted trade with the world instead of aid.
The spokesman said that the function was arranged and supervised by the LCCI President Sheikh Muhammad Arshad, Senior Vice President Almas Hyder, and Vice President Nasir Saeed. Around 70 ambassadors, diplomats and federal ministers graced the LCCI's a annual dinner.
The LCCI office-bearers appreciated the government for fighting out terrorism effectively and in maintaining law and order in the country. They said that mutual trade could be enhanced by exchanging trade delegations and organizing fairs and exhibitions. For that matter, visa regime needed to be liberalized for the bona fide businessmen.
The LCCI President said, "Potentially, we have rich resource base, young population and locational advantages. We are situated in a high growth region. But Pakistan is still going through the phase of energy crisis. Although the present government is working on war footing to address this issue but still a lot remains to be done." He said the ambassadors of all the countries should encourage their respective governments and private sectors to make investments especially in the energy sector of Pakistan.
The office-bearers urged the foreign diplomats to present a soft image of Pakistan in their respective countries and neutralize the negative affect which media had spread about Pakistan and also propagated Pakistan's actual peaceful environment rather than the one conceived presently by the world.
They said that current government's efforts in creating harmony in the country were commendable, adding that its investment friendly policies and performance could be gauged from various indicators including improvement in the GDP growth rate, expansion in foreign exchange reserves, rise in exports, stability in dollar exchange rate considerable fall in fuel prices, increased tax collection, greater workers' remittances, betterment in trade and budget deficits, maintaining CPI based inflation to single digit and upturn in major stock exchanges were some of the few examples.
They said that LCCI was an important destination of the appointed ambassadors in Pakistan and the designated ambassadors from Pakistan to other countries. They said that this institution had always tried to play a vital role in promoting trade ties with other countries.
They apprised the foreign diplomats that Pakistan?s strategic location had no match as it was not only the principal gateway to the energy rich Central Asian Republics but also shares common borders with two economic giants China and India.
It was bound to become the trade and energy corridor to these countries in the near future and this strategic advantage alone made Pakistan a marketplace teeming with possibilities.
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