Consul General of Turkiye Durmus Bastug said here on Friday that the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) was a good step for both investors and countries as the embassy of Turkey was closely monitoring the activities of the SIFC and was hopeful that the initiative would produce good results. He was speaking at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry during a meeting with LCCI President Kashif Anwar. The consul general said that the SIFC initiative would bring new investment and also help in resolving the issues being faced by investors in the country. He said that Turkiye was aware of the potential of Pakistan as the investors of Turkiye had invested around $2 billion in Pakistan and half of its investments was in Punjab which would hopefully rise to $5 billion. “We want to solve the problems being faced by the investors,” said Durmus Bastug, adding that “we are monitoring the PTA with Pakistan and will move to the second phase which is FTA after the results of PTA”. LCCI President Kashif Anwar, while appreciating the SIFC, said “we are really keen to take a reasonable share in the overall trade of Turkiye. The global exports of Turkiye were around 225 billion dollars while total imports were nearly 271 billion dollars in 2021. Taking the latest bilateral trade figures in consideration, we come to know that the share of Pakistan in total trade of Turkiye is just 0.25 percent. The LCCI President believed that there are multiple Pakistani sectors where both countries can enhance economic cooperation, especially the pharmaceutical sector of Pakistan secondly the sectors identified in SIFC, which are ideal for joint ventures between the two sides. The other key sectors with immense scope of joint ventures are tourism, information technology, agriculture technology and renewable energy. He hoped that once PTA creates goodwill and economic gains, both sides can move towards a more comprehensive free trade agreement. He stated that the quickset way to boost the economic relationship between the two sides is to encourage direct business-to-business contact through exchange of delegations and participation in single country exhibitions. The LCCI President said that under the PTA, Pakistan has gained market access in sectors such as leather, rice, dates, mangoes, cutlery, sports goods, seafood, processed agricultural products, rubber tubes, tyres, plastics and engineering goods etc. He hoped that Pakistan could utilize this market access and enhance its exports to Turkiye considerably in these sectors.