The business communities of India and Pakistan on Tuesday expressed satisfaction that the democratically elected governments in the two countries would remove misgivings and doubts that exist currently between them. Mossarat Qadeem, a member of delegation from Pakistan at an Assocham conference held in the capital said that it was highly satisfying that the issue of Pakistan president, Pervez Musharraf has been sorted out peacefully. The biggest solution for sorting out problems between the two countries is to bring the economic activities on front seat.
Assocham has suggested a host of measures to achieve the target of Indo-Pak two-way trade to $9 billion in the next few years. As per current estimates, the trade between the two countries has touched around $ 2 billion and there?s potential for future growth as economic and trade related issues would leapfrog in future burrying the political differences, Assocham president, Sajjan Jindal said.
The prospects for increased two-way trade are also based on the assumptions that cooperation between India and Pakistan has been accelerating in the field of banking, freight transport and goods like tea and rice. After the launch of South Asia Free Trade Agreement (Safta) in January 2006 and opening up of rail and road transport, bilateral trade increased to $400 million. With Safta becoming operational in July 2006, over 4000 commodities were opened for trade compared to less than 1,000 under the India ?positive list’ maintained by Pakistan. Moreover, it has been suggested that illegal trade ($1.5 billion) between the two should now be made legal, as it would lead to mutually profitable economic opportunities.
According to Assocham findings, the exports from India to Pakistan have grown at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 60% and imports at a CAGR of 64% for the period 2002-07. Bilateral trade swelled from $235.74 million in 2001-02 to more than $ 1 billion in 2006-07. Pakistan?s exports to India in total exports rose from 0.5% in 2001-02 to 1.8% in 2005-06. The main commodities of exports to Pakistan include sugar, plastic, dyes, cotton and petroleum products while main import items from Pakistan are petroleum and crude products, fruits and nuts, cotton.