Beans Import Ban Lifted, Flights To Addis Ababa To Start Soon: Ambassador-designate

A ban on import of beans from Ethiopia has been lifted while flights between Karachi and Addis Ababa would start soon

FAISALABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 1st Sep, 2020 ) :A ban on import of beans from Ethiopia has been lifted while flights between Karachi and Addis Ababa would start soon.

This was stated by Pakistan Ambassador-designate to Ethiopia Shozab Abbas.

Addressing a meeting at Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (FCCI), he said that bilateral trade between Pakistan and Ethiopia was only around $50 million, out of which the share of export from Ethiopia to Pakistan was $49 million. "Pakistan is hardly exporting any goods to Ethiopia," he added.

He said that the growth rate of Ethiopia remained 10% during the last 10 years; however, corona dented it to 4%. He said that total exports of Ethiopia were $5 billion while its imports stood at $15 billion. Three major exporting countries to Ethiopia are China, Saudi Arabia and India. He clarified that India had to give credit lines to make exports to Ethiopia.

Shozab Abbas said that the population of Ethiopia mostly consisted of Muslims and Christians. Their population is almost equal, but Muslims are dominating the business sector and he would try his best to link Ethiopian Muslim businessmen with Pakistani exporters to give a quantum jump to the bilateral trade between the two countries.

He said that Pakistan had scope of exporting agricultural machinery and appliances with technology transfer to the country. He said that there was no scope of textile exports as about four Pakistani firms from Karachi had relocated to Ethiopia about 10 years ago and they were now fully catering to the domestic needs.

He said that Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali had been awarded Nobel prize due to his visionary approach to settle the long-standing territorial issue with Eritrea. He said that Ethiopia has built a major dam with an estimated cost of $6 billion and the amount was generated from their own resources without any foreign funding.

Earlier FCCI President Rana Sikandar Azam Khan welcomed the appointment of Shozab Abbas as ambassador to Ethiopia and said that Muslims had special love and attachment with Ethiopia as Hazrat Bilal Habshi (RA) was one of the first followers of islam.

A question and answer session was also held which was participated by Senior Vice President Saqib Majeed, Engineer Asim Munir, Haleem Akhtar Malik, Ashfaq Ashraf, Haji Gulzar Ahmad, Shafiq Kashif, Rana Ikram Ullah, Habib-ur-Rehman Gill, Mian Abdul Waheed, Hajji Muhammad Amin and Babar Shahzad.