A Swedish Clean Technology and a women entrepreneurs' delegation will visit Pakistan soon that would help strengthen bilateral relations between the two countries while Sweden would extend every possible help to Pakistan in winning Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) plus status from the European Union.
Ambassador of Sweden in Pakistan Lars-Hjalmar Wide was speaking at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) on Monday. Per Malmer, Chairman Jarnamalmer, Sweden was also present in the meeting. The Swedish Ambassador said Sweden was presently doing 80 percent of its trade with regional countries in the European Union therefore, Pakistan should adopt the same methodology because it had a marvellous potential in all the sectors. He said Sweden for being an important member of European Union has a huge untapped potential and Pakistani businessmen should come forward to avail these opportunities.
He said there was a dire need to develop a close liaison between private sectors of Pakistan and Sweden for exchange of information and market research. He said both the countries needed to identify more tradable products to enhance their mutual trade. Pakistan is known around the globe for its textile products, sports goods, surgical instruments, fresh fruits and vegetables, rice, carpets, leather made ups, fish and fish preparations, handicrafts, artificial jewellery, fancy furniture, footwear, hosiery, garments, and so many other consumable items, which still needs to be properly introduced in European market. He said Pakistani business community would have to adopt an aggressive strategy to enter into Swedish market because Swedes were not only the quality conscious but very selective and careful while making deals with other countries.
Speaking on the occasion, LCCI President Irfan Qaiser Sheikh said LCCI attached great value to the upcoming delegation of the Swedish companies which promoted Clean Technologies. Since the Swedish delegation is arriving here between mid of April to early May, therefore, the LCCI has planned to organise a seminar prior to their visit in mid or late March to make our members aware of the benefits of Clean Technologies. This activity will certainly be beneficial to boost the chances of matchmaking during B2B meetings and also for exploring possibilities of joint ventures. He said the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce and LCCI had signed a MoU in November 2010 and "we keenly look forward to play our due role to make most of that opportunity."
Taking into account the trade figures of last three years, it is a noticeable factor that the volume of bilateral trade between Pakistan and Sweden has significantly dropped. In 2008, the total trade was recorded as much as dollars 453.7 million. Out of that Pakistan exported items worth dollars 102.1 million and imports from Sweden accounted for dollars 351.6 million.
But in 2009, the bilateral trade went down by 40 percent and made no significant improvement in 2010 as well. Though in 2010, Pak exports recovered well by touching over dollars 106 million mark but constantly dropping level of imports from Sweden greatly contributed to keep the total trade at dollars 280.3 million.
The LCCI President said that both the sides needed to make efforts to cease this declining trend in bilateral trade. He said Pakistan had always been experiencing trade deficit with Sweden. "We would naturally like Sweden to import more from Pakistan to create a win-win situation for both the countries."
Major exports of Pakistan to Sweden include textile products, leather products, cereals, cotton, carpets, electrical equipment sports goods and etc, but this form very insignificant segment of Sweden's import from the world.
The LCCI President said Sweden should consider increasing its imports from Pakistan particularly adding up agro products. On the other hand, Pakistan's major imports from Sweden are iron and steel, paper and paper-board, machinery, electrical and electronic equipment, pulp of wood, plastics and copper products and chemical products.