Smeda, BSMEPA exchange proposals to enhance business ties

LAHORE: The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (Smeda) and Bulgarian SME Promotion Agency (BSMEPA) have initiated a productive interaction to enhance business relations between SMEs of both the countries. Hashim Raza, Chief Executive Officer Smeda, and Boyko Takov, Executive Director of BSMEPA, exchanged a number of viable proposals while having a meeting on Zoom. They observed that a vast scope of joint ventures existed between SMEs of Bulgaria and Pakistan in the fields of information technology, horticulture, tourism, surgical instruments and technical education.

Boyko emphasized upon the need of exchanging trade delegations between the two countries and informed that his agency was planning to bring an SME delegation from Bulgaria to Pakistan in near future.

He also suggested to sign a memorandum of understanding between Smeda and BSMEPA to enhance coordination among SMEs of the two countries through exchange of SME focused trade delegations and trade fairs to be held in Pakistan and Bulgaria.

Hashim Raza expressed deep gratitude to the BSMEPA executive director for taking interest in SMEs of Pakistan and assured of the fullest cooperation on behalf of Smeda for enhancing mutual cooperation in the SME sector.

He identified a number of potential areas of bilateral trade and investment between SMEs of Pakistan and Bulgaria.

He welcomed the idea of bringing Bulgarian SMEs to Pakistan and assured to make this delegation result-oriented in developing joint ventures and enhancing bilateral trade between the two countries.

He agreed that frequent exchange of SMEs’ delegations between Bulgaria and Pakistan could create new avenues of bilateral trade in SME sectors of both the countries. It is notable that bilateral trade between Pakistan and Bulgaria fails to reflect its true potential in the current year because of Corona pandemic, although for the calendar year 2019, it was recorded at an encouraging aggregate of US 45.6 million dollars, in which Pakistan’s exports were documented at $30.9 million while imports from Bulgaria were calculated at $14.7 million. It is hoped that mutual efforts of the SME promotion organizations of the two countries would manage to exploit the existing bilateral trade potential by facilitating 45.6 direct interaction of SMEs from Pakistan and Bulgaria.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021