April 18, 2016
President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum (PBIF), President AKIA, Senior Vice Chairman of the Businessmen Panel of FPCCI and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain on Monday lauded the proposal by Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Reform Prof. Ahsan Iqbal to establish China-Pakistan business platform for joint production in economic zones under CPEC.
The proposal by Ahsan Iqbal is timely, encouraging and highly beneficial for Pakistan therefore it should be adopted immediately to kick start a new era of development, he said.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that the proposal for training of Pakistani human resource in Shandong province to learn about setting up and management of economic zones in Pakistan is a very valuable suggestion.
The third proposal by the minister also to establish linkages between universities in Shandong province and Pakistan for exchange of faculty and students as part of people-to-people contact and alignment of Pakistan exportable products with Chinese import needs to benefit the local manufacturers and increase trade volume with China is praiseworthy.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that Shandong is most developed and industrialized province of China having enormous opportunities for collaboration in sectors like textile, energy, engineering and agro-based industry.
Labour in China is demanding increased salaries therefore China can benefit from low-cost Pakistani labour by relocating their industries to Pakistan to cut costs and make their products more competitive, he added.
Pakistan can also benefit from Shandong experience in soil and water conservation, which is critical to Pakistan which has become a water stressed country.
Pakistan needs export-led growth by re-orienting the production models and can be done by leaning the Chinese experiences and expertise for which business conferences will be purposeful.
The CPEC raised investment profile of Pakistan in the world by making it safe haven for billions of Chinese investment, now it is our turn to make this project successful which would help Pakistan to become regional trading and industrialized hub.
