Daily Times

KARACHI: Federal Commerce Secretary Younus Dagha said on Monday that the government is fully committed to arrest the declining trend in exports with vigorous policy interventions to provide relief to the exporters and help identify new markets.

Dagha said this during his visit to Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP), which was attended by senior officials of the organization. Secretary TDAP Mr. Inam Ullah Khan briefed the newly appointed Secretary Commerce about the functions of the Authority which operates under the umbrella of the Ministry of Commerce. He was informed that the Authority is performing at its optimum level despite facing internal deficit of human resource and lack of capacity building opportunities. It was briefed that the Authority which is mandated to handle colossal job of diversifying export basket and find new markets is working without a functional board which negatively impacts the decision making capabilities of TDAP. Secretary Commerce assured to notify the TDAP board at the earliest.

CE TDAP Mr. S. M. Muneer also apprised the Secretary about the genuine pending refund claims amounting to billions of rupees held up by FBR which is adversely impacting the liquidity of exporters, and resulting in closures of potential SMEs. He also emphasized that TDAP is now participating in more than 150 international exhibitions to help exporters reach diversified geographical landscape.

While appreciating the efforts of TDAP, Mr. Dagha said that inter-organizational efforts needs to be taken to devise a robust quality control mechanism for all the agro based commodities destined for international markets to meet their standards.