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Thursday March 28, 2024

SCCI urges govt to ensure relief to Covid-19 hit business community

By Bureau report
May 21, 2021

PESHAWAR: President, Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Sherbaz Bilour has urged the provincial government to materialize its commitments about relief to the coronavirus and lockdown-hit business community.

“Steps need to be taken for enabling a business-friendly environment in KP as flight of capital is being witnessed from the province, which has brought unemployment after shifting of many industrial units from KP to Punjab”, said Sherbaz Bilour during a meeting with Chief Secretary Kazim Niaz in his office on Thursday.

The meeting discussed the issues pertaining to industrial estates of Peshawar. The SCCI delegation gave a number of recommendations to the provincial government for their amicable resolution.

The SCCI chief, who was accompanied by Industrialists Association Hayatabad Peshawar President Malik Imran Ishaq, proposed the introduction of a fixed tax regime instead of collection of multiple taxes in the province. He emphasized the need for taking pragmatic steps for industrialization in KP.

Sherbaz Bilour observed that the industrial growth has been slowed down since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in KP, besides small traders have adversely suffered from this pandemic.

He stressed the need for materializing promises made by the provincial government and giving a comprehensive relief to the business community which would help revive businesses and boost industrialization in the province.

The SCCI president asserted that the government should implement recommendations of SCCI and Industrialists Association Peshawar in letter and spirit. He called for the promotion of public-private partnership to resolve business community issues on a priority basis.

He said SCCI was going to set up the Business Dispute Resolution Council at the Chamber’s House to resolve the community issues through this initiative.

Malik Imran Ishaq stressed the need for strengthening a strong liaison between business community and government departments concerned. For this, he said, the government had designed a focal person, who would be provincial secretary industries.