ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Commerce (MoC) is striving hard to benefit from agreement on Simplification of Visa Procedures for the Businessmen hailing from member countries of the Development Eight (D-8) organization for economic cooperation.
The agreement on Simplification of Visa Procedures for Businessmen among the D-8 member countries has been entered into force. The agreement would facilitate the business community and would further strengthen business to business cooperation.
D-8 organization had fallen short of trade and economic goals over the last few years; therefore, through this agreement, MoC aims to achieve the target of mutual trade volume of $500 billion in the current fiscal year.
The D-8 Organization for Economic Cooperation, also known as Developing-8, is an organization for development co-operation among Bangladesh, Egypt, Nigeria, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Turkey.
“The agreement on simplification of visa procedures for the businessmen and agreement on administrative assistance in customs matters by seven members have already come into force and these agreement have given impetus to the promotion of intra D-8 trade” a well-placed source at Ministry of Commerce told Customs Today.
The source said that enforcement of trade agreements among the member states was the major success of the D-8. Likewise, ratification by almost all the member states of Preferential Trade Agreement and Visa Facilitation was an important success and MoC had played an active role in the D-8 in this regard.
“In order to enhance cooperation in the area of trade among the D-8 member countries, a Preferential Trade Agreement has already been inked and it entered into force with the ratification by Turkey, Iran, Malaysia, Nigeria and Indonesia. However, the agreement could not be operationalized as some of the countries have not yet submitted their request/offer list” the source added.
In order to move forward and operationalize the PTA, the source said that MoC is going to hold the next meeting of supervisory committee in April 2018 to remove impediments in operationalization of the agreement.
The source said that Pakistan held Expo Pakistan in November 2017. Business-Delegations from D-8 member states participated in the Expo 2017. B2B meetings held during the Expo would hold to promote Pakistan’s trade with the D-8 countries.
