LCCI urges govt to promote regional trade: LCCI

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LCCI urges govt to promote regional trade: LCCI

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The LCCI Saturday urged the government to focus on promotion of regional trade.

21 July,2012 10:21 pm

In a statement issued here, the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) President Irfan Qaiser Sheikh said that Pakistan occupies a strategic location and can play a major role in transforming the region into a trade and manufacturing hub.He said that the promotion of regional trade also offers very promising benefits to the industry as it would enable it to source raw materials from the region that reduces cost of production and creates opportunities to improve economy of scales by having easy access to neighbouring markets on the other hand.The LCCI President said that the growth in South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) region that houses 22 per cent of the world population has been projected to surpass 50 per cent of the worlds GDP by 2030 and that calls for immediate steps by the government to boost intra-regional trade.He said that a freer movement of the SAARC businessmen can transform this region into a block like European Union where the people of eight nations will remain in peace like as a family.Irfan Qaiser Sheikh said, Our region has lost momentum but it has ability to bounce back as we have over 50 per cent of young population, 12 per cent of known global natural resources, and all prerequisites to become a developed nation.He said that with markets in the US and Europe expected to experience prolonged weaknesses and the South Asian countries have the opportunity to rethink and pursue new sources of growth in both domestic and external markets.