Pakistan, Iran have tremendous potential to promote bilateral trade

Islamabad

Mehdi Honardoost, Ambassador of Iran, said that Pakistan and Iran have tremendous potential to promote bilateral trade in various sectors, but lack of payment mechanism through banking channels was the major hurdle in realising these goals. He said that despite having a preferential trade agreement between the two countries, Iran's trade with Afghanistan was five times more than Pakistan.

He said Iran has $20 billion annual bilateral trade with Turkey and $50 billion with China, but almost negligible trade with Pakistan, which was unfortunate. He said this while addressing business community at Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (ICCI).

When the Iranian envoy was apprised that his country has imposed high tariffs on some Pakistani products, he said that signing of free trade agreement between Iran and Pakistan would resolve all these problems. He said Iranians preferred Pakistani products and stressed that Pakistan should step up efforts for early signing of FTA with Iran. He said Iran's biotechnology was better than many European countries and added that Pakistan could achieve beneficial results for its economy by enhancing cooperation with Iran in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, agriculture and other fields. He said one Iranian company spent one million to bring electricity from Iran to Gwadar, but was not getting encouraging response from Pakistan. He assured that his embassy would fully cooperate with Pakistani business community in enhancing trade with Iran.

Speaking on the occasion, ICCI President Khalid Iqbal Malik, Senior Vice President Khalid Malik, and Vice President Tahir Ayub said that Iran has imposed high tariffs on Pakistani products including textiles, clothing, leather products, rice, fruits and vegetables which ranged from 90% to 200% and stressed that Iran should reconsider its high tariffs to facilitate Pakistan's private sector in promoting trade with it.