LAHORE: “The Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry will establish special Indonesia Desk at the chamber to boost two-way trade”.
This was stated by the LCCI President Mian Nauman Kabir while talking to the Ambassador of Indonesia Adam Mulawarman Tugio at the chamber. Senior Vice-President Mian Rehman Aziz Chan and Vice-President Haris Ateeq also spoke on the occasion.
The ambassador said that both the countries are leader in Muslim countries as far as population is concerned. He said that there is a lot of potential to increase two-way trade. He said the LCCI can play vital role to boost mutual trade. He also called to promote “Islamic Economy” saying that trade between Islamic countries is very low.
He invited Pakistani companies to participate in the Trade Show in Indonesia to be held in October. He informed the participants that ban on palm oil export to Pakistan has been lifted. He said that Pakistan should focus on market and product diversification.
The ambassador said that the business community of Pakistan should play its due role in promoting trade and investments in ASEAN countries such as Indonesia. He pointed out that there were ample opportunities for the Pakistani business community in the $ 1 trillion market of Indonesia.
He stressed that the strengthening of bilateral trade and investment could benefit the business communities of both countries.
“The two nations have immense potential for cooperation in diverse fields including tourism, trade, e-commerce, textile, automobile, pharmaceutical, herbal medicines, spices and defence”, he mentioned.
The envoy said that Indonesia had a rich culture of tourism and hospitality and its government wanted to fetch 10 percent of the annual national income from that sector alone but due to the ongoing Covid-19 wave, it was unable to achieve the objective.
Speaking on the occasion, LCCI President Mian Nauman Kabir said that “Indonesia Desk” will be established at LCCI. He said that both Pakistan and Indonesia are important members of OIC and shared the responsibility of serving the Muslim community. Indonesia shares borders with important countries like Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Australia and Papua New Guinea etc.
He said that Indonesia comprises of more than 17,000 islands and is home to thousands of different flora and fauna, making it the country with the second highest level of biodiversity in the world after Brazil.
Kabir said Pakistan attaches great importance to its historic relations with Indonesia, the foundation of which was laid by Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, and Soekarno – the well known Indonesian statesman, orator and nationalist who was the first president of Indonesia, serving from 1945 to 1967.
Pakistan has unfavourable balance of trade with Indonesia and bilateral trade deficit has further widened in recent times.
The LCCI chief said that according to trade figures taken from the State Bank, Pakistan’s imports from Indonesia were to the tune of US 1.3 billion dollars in 2020-21 which have gone well over to 2.5 billion dollars during the eleven months of current financial year. In contrast to that Pakistan’s exports which were around US 142 million dollars in last fiscal year have only reached the level of US 107 million dollars from July 2021 to May 2022.
“We need to make efforts to bridge the ever increasing trade deficit and to enhance the trade volume to at least US five billion dollars by identifying new avenues of trade and economic cooperation. There is also need of better utilisation of Preferential Trade Agreement between the two countries in order to work towards Free Trade Agreement”, he added.
Kabir said that our imports from Indonesia mainly including palm oil, coal, artificial staple fibers, motor vehicles, natural rubber, uncoated paper and paperboard etc while our major exports to Indonesia are rice, citrus fruit, frozen fish, woven fabrics of cotton, and leather etc.
He said that there is a considerable potential for Pakistan to enhance its exports to Indonesia in the sectors of value added textiles, pharmaceuticals, light engineering, surgical instruments and sports goods etc.
He proposed that these potential areas need to be studied and monitored by the commercial sections of our respective diplomatic missions for promoting trade and investment between two countries.
LCCI Senior Vice-President Mian Rehman Aziz Chan said that this is high time to enhance partnerships amongst the business communities of Pakistan and Indonesia through diversifying the current trade options and outreaching to new markets of both the countries. He said that arranging trade fairs, exhibitions and exchange of trade based business delegations can play an imperative role in this connection.
LCCI Vice-President Haris Ateeq said that both the countries should consider barter trade in specific products. He also called to create a joint working group to increase mutual trade.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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