Lahore
Like the whole business community, the Pakistan Industrial & Traders Association Front (PIAF) has also appreciated the Prime Minister and the Chief of the Army Staff for holding meetings with the businessmen on financial matters, stressing the need for taking all stakeholders onboard including leading chambers and industrial associations, taking their input on key economic issues so that the country could be back on right track of economic growth.
PIAF Chairman Mian Nauman Kabir, in a statement issued here on Sunday, said that the few top business tycoons met recently with Imran Khan and army chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa where no representative of any chamber, trade and industrial bodies were present, which represent the SMEs, constituting nearly 90 percent of all the enterprises in Pakistan, employing 80 percent of the non-agricultural labour force; and share of which in the annual GDP is around 40 percent.He said that the government called only the large enterprises and ignored the small and medium enterprises’ representatives, who are actually constrained by financial and other resources. PIAF strongly believes that SME sector is the backbone of any economy.
PIAF chief said that in a country like Pakistan where more than 60% of the population is rural based it is very important to enhance the capacities of rural centric SMEs to help them scale and contribute to the overall economic growth.
Mian Nauman Kabir asked the government to create an enabling environment as per the objectives of the business community, which was imperative for the national development. He said the PIAF was ready to fully cooperate with the government so that country could overcome economic and financial problems.
