Federal Minister for Board of Investment Chaudhry Salik Hussain said on Monday that no foreign investment could be attracted without facilitation from the local investors.
He was talking to the business community here at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry. LCCI President Kashif Anwar and Senior Vice President Chaudhry Zafar Mahmood also spoke.
The federal minister said that before giving priority and protocol to foreign investors, incentives should be given to the local investors first, because if they were happy, only then someone from outside would come to invest here.
He said that situation in Pakistan was that the investors had to go to the public institutions again and again, for one reason or the other. The aim of the institutions should be helping the business community run their businesses and not harassing them. Such an environment should be created here that people could expand their businesses, he suggested.
Chaudhry Salik said that Special Economic Zones (SEZs) were functioning in the same way as Export Processing Zones. The penalties that were being imposed on solar in some societies would be discussed as the whole world were currently investing in renewable energy.
He said that chambers should give their opinion on dollar amnesty so that a scheme could be executed to convince those who retained dollars. He said that no political party had an economic manifesto. “First we have to ask ourselves that whenever a party comes to power, do they have any economic policy,” he added.
About the Afghan transit trade, he said that Afghanistan was a landlocked country and the only way was to supply goods there by land route.
“We will have to continue the Afghan transit trade, but the taxes should be revisited. I will continue to raise my voice on issues like refunds, taxes, investment of the business community,” he said.—APP
