Our correspondent
Lahore
Pakistan Businesses Forum (PBF) on Friday said that climate and fertile soil of Gilgit-Baltistan offer ideal environment for producing fruits like apples, peach, cherries, almonds, apricot, etc and GB farmers produce over 100,000 tonnes of fresh apricots a year.
“Setting up the fruit processing industry in the region would help boost the country’s fruit exports”.
Talking to delegation of Gilgit Chamber of Commerce, PBF Vice President Ahmad Jawad said low volume of trade between Pakistan and China is not reflective of the economic size of two neighbouring countries.
This indicates there is a huge untapped trade potential in both countries, which can be utilized mainly to enhance welfare of the masses and Gilgit Baltistan would be key gateway to strengthen bilateral trade.
Jawad said, initially the CPEC plan does not really benefit GB in the short-term, since no direct industrial projects are being established. However, if we take a look at the long-term perspective, with the establishment of businesses, telecommunication networks and infrastructure projects, GB will start to benefit economically. Therefore, ‘There’s a dire need for the policy makers in the government to develop plans in GB of think-tanks to focus on the core issues directly.’
