THE Ministry of Commerce on Friday unveiled the National Priority Sectors Export Strategy (NPSES), with a focus on 10 priority sectors to achieve growth in exports.
The strategy is part of the Strategic Trade Policy Framework 2020-25, approved in November last year and identified 18 priority sectors with guidelines to develop sector-specific policy measures to promote their exports.
The Ministry, led by highly experienced Syed Naveed Qamar, deserves credit for prioritizing sectors with potential to help promote exports significantly, which is the only viable option to resolve financial and economic vows of the country.
The priority sectors include engineering goods, leather, processed food and beverages, fruits and vegetables, meat and poultry, pharmaceuticals, software development and services, business process outsourcing, logistics and institutional coordination.
The five year action-oriented framework has the potential to meaningfully increase trade’s contribution to economic development but much depends on what the Government does to align fiscal and economic policies with the overall aims and objectives that the Ministry of Commerce intends to pursue during this period.
We hope the Minister and his team would have brain-storming sessions with Finance Ministry and other relevant ministries/institutions and stakeholders to translate the goals into actions through measures to reduce the cost of doing business, targeted subsidies, provision of relief where due, focus on research and development, value addition, quality control, transfer of technology and economic diplomacy.
