After 11-year slowdown, Pak-Afghan trade rising again

Islamabad: After an 11-year slowdown in trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan for decades, it has increased again from July last year. The volume of bilateral trade reached 1.8 billion dollars by June this year.

11 years ago, the volume of bilateral trade had reached $3 billion. But after the year 2012, it started to decrease and by the year 2014, the volume of trade decreased to 1.4 billion dollars.

The former president of Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry Zahid Shinwari said that the bilateral trade between the two countries has reached $1.8 billion by June this year, however due to customs clearance problems, thousands of freight vehicles have to cross the border for several days. Due to which traders have to pay extra rent and exports are also affected.

Zia-ul-Haq Sarhadi stated that last year 2,50,000 tons of sugar, cement, medicines, food items and animal feed worth 968 million dollars were exported from Pakistan to Afghanistan.

He added: “$893 million were imported from Afghanistan to Pakistan, which includes coal, vegetables and fruits and other goods”.

Businessman said the business community is worried about the increase in electricity bills, rising petrol prices and shortage of dollars in the country.

He has demanded that federal government should take immediate steps to create ease of doing business to increase domestic foreign exchange reserves.