Staff Reporter
Islamabad
Adviser to the Prime Minister on Commerce, Industries and Investment Abdul Razak Dawood Tuesday highlighted the importance of bridging the data gaps through integration of various data to reflect the true picture of exports.
Addressing a press conference here, the adviser said the government intended to include export processing zones (EPZs) in the trade collection data, which were not currently taken into account by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) and the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
Exclusion of exports routed through the EPZs by the two organizations resulted into a difference of $1.2 billion between the actual exports and those reported by them, he added.
The adviser said the federal cabinet had already approved the e-commerce policy for promoting the digital culture and paperless trade to help enhance the trade volume.
He said the country’s exports touched $5.5 billion and imports $ 11.3 billion during the first quarter of current fiscal year (2019-20). The figures reflected that the trade deficit narrowed to $ 5.7 billion this year as compared to $8.7 billion during the corresponding period of last fiscal year (2018-19), showing decline of around 35 percent.
The exports in September were recorded $ 2 billion, he added.
He said the software export potential was not being exploited properly as three different softwares were being used by freelancers to acquire the work deals from abroad.
He said mainly the youth were providing their services (to individuals / firms abroad) through the freelancing system, but they were facing problems because of different softwares. The government would facilitate them so that they could work with ease, he added.
He said it was the government’s priority to evolve the integrated trade data system and streamline the affairs by the end of October. All the system would be linked to the Ministry of Commerce under the control of SBP to promote the culture of freelancing to capture opportunities in the global market through websites and other digital tools, he added.
Replying to a question, he said the China and Pakistan Free Trade Agreement (FTA) II signed in June, would hopefully be executed by December.
He said the Gwadar Port was operational now, which had given further strengthened the relations between Pakistan and China.
