Mian Zahid Hussain says achieving this year’s export target of $27.5 billion difficult to achieve
ISLAMABAD: Exports from Pakistan are steadily falling, hurting the confidence of investors, hitting forex reserves and renewing fears of losing export markets.
This was stated by Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum (PBIF) President Mian Zahid Hussain while speaking to the business community.
He said that exports are stagnant since the last few years due to lack of necessary action, which make the current year’s export target of $27.5 billion difficult to achieve. He expressed fear that imports can rise above $40 billion, creating problems for economy.
Mian Zahid Hussain, who has also served as Minister for Information Technology (Sindh), said that pushing exports to $50 billion is not difficult if some steps are taken in the right direction.
He said that some elements think that spending billions on useless exhibitions, foreign tours and flowery statements can make a difference, which is a deception.
Those assigned for enhancing exports would waste money and later blame the energy crisis to absolve themselves of all the responsibility, he said, adding that the energy crisis has not worsened, but reduced under the incumbent administration.
He said that the TDAP has claimed to gain export orders worth $2.5 billion in the last two expos, a claim contradicted by the statistics of the government department concerned.
The fact remains that exports have registered a decline of five percent in the first eight months of the current fiscal year, he said, adding that textile exports in March were over a billion dollar less than exports in March 2014.
The situation can be changed by ending ad-hocism, promoting SME sector, establishing export and import bank, appointment of professionals on key posts and taking some unpopular decisions, said Mian Zahid Hussain.
