FAISALABAD. The business community of Pakistan should exert pressure to immediately process and establish Nigeria-Pakistan Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry in order to give a quantum jump to economic relations between the two countries.
This was stated by High Commissioner of Nigeria to Pakistan Dauda Donaldi while addressing the members of Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry during his visit here today.
He underlined the objective of his visit to FCCI and said that Nigeria and Pakistan have identical problems and history. No doubt they are enjoying good cordial relations for the last many years but these relations could not be translated into economic term due to different reasons. He said that last year the first joint ministerial conference of Nigeria and Pakistan was held to capitalize the trade potential of two countries which was followed by the visit of President of Pakistan Mamnoon Hussain and a number of agreements were signed for cooperation in the fields of trade and industry, agriculture, rice processing, pharmaceutical and textiles etc.
He quoted the statistics and said that Nigeria is importing textile products worth US$ 8 billion per annum but the share of Pakistan is very nominal. On the other hand India is dominating the Nigerian textile markets. He further pointed out that agreements/MOUs have not yet been fully exploited and Pakistani business community should pressurize its Government to make tangible progress in this respect. He said that Pakistani Chambers should also make efforts to make Nigeria Pakistan Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry functional at the earliest.
Responding to a question, he said that Nigeria is now very peaceful country as elaborate measures were taken to crush the militancy. He said that FATA and Faisalabad could not be compared; similarly, the most parts of the Nigeria are very peaceful without any incident of terrorism. He said that both the countries should arrange single country exhibitions in addition to encouraging trade delegations to one another country. In this connection he said that he was ready to further improve the visa regime so that any businessman could get visa without any hassle. He also presented a documentary explaining trade potential of the two countries and said that Pakistani exporters should come forward with aggressive marketing strategies to penetrate deep into the Africa through Nigeria
Earlier in his Welcome Address, the Acting President FCCI Nadeem Iqbal Allahwala said that Pakistan and Nigeria enjoys extremely cordial economic and political relations at all international forums including members of D-8 forum and Organization of Islamic countries (OIC) in addition to having strong friendly and diplomatic relations. Both the countries share many similarities as to economy composition, population and colonial history.
He said if we compare the economy size of Nigeria i.e $522 billion with that of Pakistan as US$ 233 billion, the trade volume between the two countries was only $79.52 million in 2014. Though there has been some increase in the last year but trade volume is still quite negligible.
He said that Nigeria exported $17.76 million worth of goods to our country while Pakistan’s exports stood at US$ 61.76 million.
He said that there are vast prospects of expansion of bilateral trade including joint ventures in Textile, agro-based industry, leather goods and Information Technology.
With the massive changes in international trade and being both the countries members of D-8 forum, Nigeria can take benefit of mechanized agriculture expertise which can develop the Nigerian agriculture sector to prove as food basket for whole of African continent, he added
He emphasized on the frequent exchange of trade delegations, increased liaison and trade information of potential buyers of Pakistani products in Nigeria, Identify more and more tradable products with priority be given to each others’ products, sector-specific delegation to Nigeria, Single Country exhibition at important cities in Nigeria and participation in trade exhibition in both the countries.
Chaudhary Haq Nawaz and Muhammad Talha sheikh in addition to other participants took part in the question-answer session. Nigerian High commissioner and Nadeem Allahwala exchanged shields while vice president FCCI Inaam Afzal Khan decorated first secretary of Nigeria Mr Madia Suwia with FCCI Pin. Nigerian High Commissioner also presented informative literature about Nigeria to Nadeem Allahwala.
Later Vice President Inaam Afzal thanked the guest and participants of the meeting and told that former president of FCCI Mian Muhammad Adrees is now heading the Federation of Pakistan chambers of commerce and Industry and he will personally request him to intervene and play his role for the establishment of Nigeria-Pakistan Joint chambers of commerce and Industry.
