The 5th session of the Belarus-Pakistan Business Council

The Belarusian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, together with the Federation of Pakistani Chambers of Commerce and Industry, organized the 5^th session of the Belarus-Pakistan Business Council. The event was held in Minsk, in a traditional, offline format.

Participating in the meeting were the BelCCI Chairman Vladimir Ulakhovich, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus Mikalai Barysevich, Deputy Minister of Energy of the Republic of Belarus Denis Moroz, President of the Federation of Pakistani Chambers of Commerce and Industry Mian Nasser Hyatt Maggo, Chairman of the Pakistan-Belarus Business Council Shahzad Sabir, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to the Republic of Belarus Sajjad Haider Khan, representatives of about 100 Belarusian and more than 60 Pakistani companies and organizations.

The BelCCI Chairman said that Pakistan imports some $47 billion worth of products annually, and Belarus, in his words, can be an important partner for Pakistan in this regard. “The country knows Belarusian machines, the tractor “Belarus” in particular. Today we are discussing the opportunity to set up a facility to assemble 10,000 Belarusian tractors a year in Pakistan. This project is now in progress and preliminary documents have been signed. We see the possibility of setting up joint ventures in the pharmaceutical sector and, of course, in food production,” Vladimir Ulakhovich said.

“Today we are hosting a big event and, of course, such meetings of the business community affect both the volume of our trade and export supplies. This year is showing good dynamics, exports grew 63 percent in January–June. I think we will post good figures this year, because the potential for cooperation is huge,” the BelCCI Chairman noted.

In turn, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus Mikalai Barysevich underlined that relations between Belarus and Pakistan are growing strategic. The states have created the basic conditions for the development of bilateral relations across the areas of mutual interest.

According to the Deputy Foreign Minister, it is important that the parties ensure the progressive development of promising points of growth. “In our opinion, taking into account the structure of the economies of Belarus and Pakistan, we can identify several key areas of work. In particular, we can step up mutual trade of traditional products, set up joint manufactures of Belarusian equipment in Pakistan, and also joint ventures to make surgical instruments and leather products in Belarus. Setting up joint medicine production clusters is promising. They can be based both in Belarus and in Pakistan. We need to attract Pakistani capital into projects to upgrade Belarusian enterprises of the textile industry, to develop joint agricultural manufactures, to implement joint scientific projects with commercialization opportunities and also projects to create a university of applied technologies in Pakistan that will provide high-quality joint professional and technical training of Pakistani specialists using Belarusian educational technologies,” Mikalai Barysevich noted.

The session participants discussed the current state and prospects for the development of Belarus-Pakistan trade, economic and investment cooperation, the directions of the Business Council activities aimed to strengthen the economic potential of bilateral relations, the specific questions and proposals of business. Presentations were delivered of the opportunities offered by the Great Stone China-Belarus Industrial Park for foreign investors, the successful and promising bilateral projects in pharmaceutical sector, in agriculture, chemical, textile industry.

The plenary session was followed by B2B meetings of Belarusian and Pakistani business people, who negotiated future mutually beneficial cooperation in the fields of chemical, light, food industry, pharmaceutical production, construction, transport and logistics, tourism, etc.

Based on BelTA materials