Pakistani Commerce Minister Makhdoom Amin Fahim is likely to visit India on September 26-30 to boost bilateral trade between the two countries. Pakistan has agreed to grant India the most favoured nation (MFN) status officially.
Both sides would also seek to liberalise the visa regime for their respective businessmen and remove some of the non-tariff barriers that hamper the flow of trade presently.
During his four-day visit, Fahim is also expected to visit Mumbai and Bangalore leading the largest business delegation ever comprising top Pakistani businessmen. This will be the first such meeting between the commerce ministers of two countries after a gap of three years.
Early this month, commerce, industry and textiles minister Anand Sharma had formally invited his Pakistani counterpart to visit India to take forward some of the measures discussed to augment trade during the secretaries level talks in April between commerce secretary Rahul Khullar and his counterpart Zafar Mahmood.
Under the World Trade Organisation rules, trading partners offer MFN status to each other to enjoy the trade benefits. Granting of MFN status means lowering of tariffs and customs duties for the products tradeed between them.
India is expected to raise the issue of “proper implementation and ratification of the provisions under the South Asia Free Trade Agreement” that would ensure greater access to its products in Pakistan with reduced tariffs, while Pakistan is expected to ask for the removal of several non-tariff barriers that hamper the entry of their goods into India.
The Indian government has also asked Pakistan to allow trading of those goods, which are now prohibited to be traded on the land route, officials told Business Standard.
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“It is not clear in what manner will they grant the MFN status. There is no clarity on the number of items that would come under the positive list,” a senior official said requesting anonymity. At present, more than 12,000 items are there on Pakistan’s negative list while 1,948 items come under the positive list.
Pakistan is expected to prune their negative list by October.
Apparently, the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) under the ministry of commerce and industry is holding inter-ministerial consultations to remove the generic ban on capital inflows from Pakistan.
All these issues were discussed during the joint task force meeting in New Delhi recently, which was attended by Department of Commerce Joint Secretary Arvind Mehta, Minister (Trade), High Commission of Pakistan in India, Naeem Anwar and Karachi Chamber of Commerce & Industry Vice-President Junaid Esmail Makda among others.
During the meeting it was decided that Pakistan would work out a liberal business visa regime scheme of multiple-entry visas, which will also be reciprocated by India. It was also decided that both sides would ensure greater flow of goods through the land routes such as the Wagah-Attari and Monabao-Khokrapar border. Both sides have also decided to put an end to the informal trade that takes place through Dubai amounting to more than $2 billion by facilitating seamless flow of traffic between both countries.
Bilateral trade between India and Pakistan is $2 billion at present. It is expected to increase to $10 billion in the next three years with the grant of MFN status and removal of non-tariff barriers, according to the Federation of Indian Export Organisations.