LAHORE: The Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) celebrated “Australia Day” at a prestigious cake-cutting ceremony at the LCCI, here on Friday.
Participants of the ceremony including High Commissioner of Australia to Pakistan Ms. Margaret Adamson, LCCI President Abdul Basit, Senior Vice President Amjad Ali Jawa, Salman Basit, Ali Hassam Asghar, Tehmina Saeed Chaudhry and various others pledged to make mutual friendly and cordial relations more stronger.
The Australian High Commissioner said that Australia and Pakistan were strategic partners and enjoying long-standing cordial relations that had built on strong business-to-business and people-to-people connections.
She said that Australia and Pakistan should actively explore new avenues to expand trade and investment as both countries had significant prospects to growth bilateral trade and investment. She said that Pakistan could avail Australian expertise in various economic sectors.
She also called for frequent exchange of business-related delegations so that both the sides could have first-hand knowledge of the available opportunities.
She said that Pakistani goods were best of the best in the world and had a very huge potential in Australian market, therefore, Pakistani businessmen should focus on joint ventures with their Australian counterparts.
LCCI President Abdul Basit said collaboration and assistance in fields of sports, education etc. and joint efforts to develop business to business contacts were bound to bring positive results soon. He said that last year in April, a business delegation from Australia visited Lahore Chamber accompanied by the diplomats from Consulate General of Pakistan in Sydney, Australia. Afterwards, the representatives of Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade, Canberra, Australia came to Lahore Chamber to discuss matters of mutual concerns, he added.
He said that more such delegation would be beneficial for the both countries. He informed the Australian High Commissioner that to reciprocate those visits, a businessmen delegation from Lahore Chamber went to Australia during February this year to attend Halal Expo 2017 in Sydney.
He said that the LCCI also interacted with the representatives of public and private sectors and grateful to Australian High Commissioner for extending best cooperation to LCCI in this connection.
