Poor Connectivity Identified Barrier In Pakistan-Tajikistan Trade

Ambassador of Tajikistan to Pakistan Ismatullo Nasredin and Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) President Muhammad Idrees Memon emphasized on strengthening connectivity between Pakistan and Tajikistan for increasing trade In a meeting held here at KCCI, they also stressed the need to start direct flights between Pakistan and Tajikistan, which would drastically reduce the travel time to just 'one hour and twenty minutes from 22 hours as currently the travelers take connecting flights either from Dubai or Istanbul to reach Dushanbe, said KCCI release on Thursday

KARACHI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 31st Mar, 2022 ) :Ambassador of Tajikistan to Pakistan Ismatullo Nasredin and Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) President Muhammad Idrees Memon emphasized on strengthening connectivity between Pakistan and Tajikistan for increasing trade In a meeting held here at KCCI, they also stressed the need to start direct flights between Pakistan and Tajikistan, which would drastically reduce the travel time to just 'one hour and twenty minutes from 22 hours as currently the travelers take connecting flights either from Dubai or Istanbul to reach Dushanbe, said KCCI release on Thursday.

They noted that despite being geographically close to each other and having huge potential to improve trade and economic, trade volume remains very limited due to lack of connectivity which was the most serious obstacle, disallowing the two countries to be more closer to each other.

The ambassador, who was on his second visit to Karachi, informed that he would be holding a meeting with Pakistan's Civil Aviation Authority next week and subsequently discuss this issue with Tajik Civil Aviation Authority as well so that this pressing problem could be sorted out as it was not feasible for businessmen to travel for 22 hours to reach Dushanbe which was less than one-and-a-half away from Pakistan.

He further mentioned that although Pakistan and Tajikistan shared excellent relation and Pakistan was a reliable partner of Tajikistan in terms of political relations, security, economic and cultural cooperation but still "there are a lot of problems that we both need to overcome." Commenting on declining trade volume between the two countries, the Envoy said that the peak time was 2013 when trade between Tajikistan and Pakistan touched US$94 million but it has been constantly declining since then and dropped to US$25 million in 2020.

He said, "In addition to 22 documents signed during last year's Tajikistan President's visit to Pakistan in June and Pakistan Prime Minister's visit to Tajikistan in September, a total 77 bilateral documents had been signed by both countries during the last 30 years, of which more than 50 documents are related to economic field but unfortunately, only 10 percent of these documents remain effective while the rest of 90 percent of the documents are on papers only.

"We have Tajik businessmen who are interested in doing business with Pakistani counterparts but this was not happening due to lack of information about each other which is another issue hindering trade", he added.

He said that for the landlocked Tajikistan, Karachi Port was ideal for trade as it was just 2200 kilometers away from Dushanbe and very cost effective. The shipment cost from Karachi Port was around $3,000 only which was three times lower as compared to shipment cost of US$10,000 from Poti Seaport in Georgia which was also being used by Tajik businessmen due to difficulties in Afghanistan. "We are also looking into the possibility of shifting some of the Tajik shipments to Gwadar Port as Karachi Port remains quite busy", he said, "The only viable possibility for Tajikistan to reach warm waters is via Pakistani ports."The ambassador also requested the Karachi Chamber to organize a delegation's visit to Tajikistan to explore partners and possibilities which was the best and only way to improve trade, economic and investment cooperation. "Your visit to Tajikistan will be fully facilitated by the Tajik Embassy," he assured.