'Pride of Pakistan' promotes a wealth of Pakistan-Lanka business contacts
 

BY CHANDANI Jayatilleke

FOLLOWING the success of the 'Pride of Pakistan', single country exhibition in Colombo last week, Pakistan plans to hold another major event targeted at Sri Lankan consumers in a few months.

The Pride of Pakistan was the first opportunity under the Sri Lanka-Pakistan Free Trade Agreement (FTA) for business, trade and consumer interaction.

"We rate it an excellent event," remarked Nusrat Iqbal Jamshed, Director, Export Promotion Bureau of Pakistan on the last day of the exhibition.

"We go back with good contacts, prospective proposals and many memorable experiences of Sri Lanka," he told the Daily News when we met him at the BMICH Exhibition and Convention Centre last Saturday.

"Look at the faces of our exhibitors. They are very happy, you can gauge their success from their facial expressions," he said answering a question on how the exhibitors felt about the whole effort.

Jamshed, being the main person behind the exhibition said it was arranged within a short time, because they wanted to come to Colombo soon after the signing of the FTA.

The Sri Lanka-Pakistan FTA was made effective following President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga's visit to that country in February.

During this exhibition, Pakistanis learnt many good lessons about the Sri Lankan market and its consumers. "Sri Lankans love handicrafts and fabrics. But this was not a consumer fair and most items we had brought were not for sale," Jamshed said.

Exhibitors, although the number of companies which participated at the event was 28, made useful contacts with Sri Lankan counterparts. The range of exhibits varied from fabrics, handicraft, surgical and medical equipment, glass, furniture and fruit sectors.

According to Jamshed the exhibitors were pleased with the outcome. "Some of them are of the view that Pakistan should have got more exhibitors. Because Colombo's response was so good," he said.

The world consists of sellers and buyers. The South Asian countries are sellers and their top buyers are the US and Europe.

"To gain the maximum benefits being sellers, we need to build trade networks - we need more strong relations among the South Asian nations.

"We believe, Sri Lanka - Pakistan Free Trade Agreement as a first step towards this networking concept. Sri Lanka already has a FTA with India and also pursuing a similar agreement with Bangladesh," Jamshed said.

He also proposed to the Governments of Sri Lanka and Pakistan to jointly organise a large scale exhibition in Bangladesh and convince them of the importance of being part of a regional trade network.

"Afterwards these three nations should take the lead and organise a similar event in India and show the whole world, as a region, we are a strong force of trade," he said.

Many of the exhibitors we spoke to were quite impressed with the show.

Muhammad Asif Teli, Chief Executive, Nakshbandi Industries Ltd, a leading textile company in Pakistan said that they were extremely happy about coming to Sri Lanka for a trade exhibition of this nature.

"We already had contacts with several Sri Lankan garment manufacturers, but this was the first time we came here on a trade mission. We had many inquiries, made many new contacts, and we are quite pleased with the response we had," he said.

Sri Lanka's garment industry is a major concern of the FTA. Pakistan offered to help Sri Lanka's garments industry by way of allowing three million pieces of apparel exports to that country, as part of the FTA. This is an exclusive agreement with Sri Lanka, as Pakistan is concerned about Sri Lanka's garment industry.

Saifi Chaudry, Chief Executive of Shezan Pure Food Products belongs to the oldest generation of businessmen in Pakistan at present. His company is into exporting of fruit and fruit products and manufacturing textiles.

"During this trade exhibition, we found three business partners from Sri Lanka with whom we wish to pursue our trade in the future. Apart from these contacts, our stall was visited by a large number of people. Many of them wanted to buy our products, but we only had samples in our stall," he said.

In Pakistan, the company owns a 60% share in the fruit market. And there are three major factories in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad. The company also exports to 75 to 80 countries although it did not export to Sri Lanka. "Through the FTA we hope to build up a joint venture with Sri Lanka in the near future," Chaudhry said.

Chaudhry's wife who accompanied him was also impressed with the outcome of the trade show and said: "It was quite successful and being in Sri Lanka for the first time on a business trip, I made a lot of contacts."

The business delegation was also happy about the short trip to Kandy and Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage which came as part of their visit. "We enjoyed the trip to Kandy and we have many sweet memories of Sri Lanka to take back with us," Chaudhry said.

In the group there were four women entrepreneurs. Safia Bano of Ladies Choice from Karachi was one of the busiest persons at the exhibition. Her stall was frequently thronged by crowds, especially the women. She was overwhelmed by her success.

"I am into textile and costume jewellery business. Basically, I got a good response from the Sri Lankan people. They like cotton fabrics and jewelleries. I think we should have more exhibitions and trade fairs of this nature in the future," she said.

Bano added that she was glad about making the right decision to participate at the Colombo's exhibition.

Deputy High Commissioner of Pakistan in Sri Lanka, Ishtiaq H. Andrabi said the Colombo's trade exhibition has given valuable first-hand experiences to almost all the exhibitors.

"From this point onwards, we hope that the business communities in the two countries would pursue their contacts and reap the benefits together, while passing down a decent share to the consumer," he said.