Nepal wants direct flights with Pakistan to promote bilateral trade

ISLAMABAD: Ambassador of Nepal Tapas Adhikari here on Wednesday said that Pakistan and Nepal had great potential to enhance trade and economic cooperation and stressed the need for exploring the possibility of starting direct flights with Nepal that would help in promoting two-way trade between the two countries.

He said that trade promotion would help both countries to reduce unemployment and improve living standards of their people.

He said that Pakistan and Nepal had great scope to enhance cooperation in tourism sector as both countries possessed highest peaks in the world.

He was addressing the business community during his visit to Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said a press release.

He said that Pakistani business community should visit Nepal while he would also try to bring a delegation of Nepalese businessmen to Pakistan for promoting business linkages between both countries.

He said that Nepalese people had great love for Pakistan and they wanted to further promote the trade relations.

The delegation of Chaman Chamber of Commerce and Industry led by President Jalal Khan was also present at the occasion.

Speaking at the occasion, Sardar Yasir Ilyas Khan, President ICCI urged Pakistan and Nepal to focus on developing strong business linkages between their private sectors in order to explore all untapped areas of bilateral trade and economic relations as the current volume of trade was far less than the actual potential of both countries.

He said that Pakistan could provide many products to Nepal including machinery and parts, pharmaceuticals, electronic appliances, textiles products and leather goods.

The opportunities also existing in furniture products, fruits & vegetables, meat products and many others, therefore, both countries should find ways for direct trade to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes.

He said that Pakistan and Nepal had the potential to cooperate with each other in agriculture and livestock, industry, energy, tourism, IT, banking and finance.

The both countries also have potential for cooperating in health, education, civil aviation and many other fields for which direct connectivity between private sectors was important.

He urged that Pakistan and Nepal to encourage frequent exchange of trade delegations to promote mutual collaboration and strengthen trade relations.

He said that Pakistan and Nepal had signed a trade cooperation long time ago which should be fully exploited for two-way trade promotion.

Fatma Azim Senior Vice President, Abdul Rehman Khan Vice President ICCI also spoke at the occasion and called for restarting direct flights between Pakistan and Nepal to bridge gap and promote trade relations between the two countries.

They said that direct flights took only 2 hours while currently indirect flight was taking around 22 hours between the two countries, which showed the importance of direct flights for promotion of B2B and people to people relations between Pakistan and Nepal.