SAARC needs to boost volume of trade - Prof. Peiris

Indunil Hewage

It is imperative exploring practical avenues to increase the level of trade within SAARC member countries, External Affairs Minister Prof G.L Peiris said. “In the African region, strong steps have been taken to promote intra regional trade within the African region and they have come together and have inked agreements

to promote trade among African nations, which had a negative impact on Sri Lankan tea exports into markets that we used to have in the major parts of the Africa continent. This has been the global trade trend through out the world, which we need to take into account seriously,”he said.

“It is a matter of great regret that the volume of trade within the SAARC region is far below than what it should be.

There are eight countries which constitute the SAARC. In these countries, we have a population of 1.5 billion representing approximately one fifth of the global population or twenty percent of global humanity.

Today, the volume of trade within the SAARC region is only 5%, while the volume of trade within the European Union is 55%, 52% in North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 32% in Asia Pacific Regional Cooperation and a total trade volume within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries, which amounts to 22%.

“Today the South Asian region must have a prudent mechanism to facilitate trade within SAARC countries and businessmen need to be proactive and need to get into a position where they could influence the government, with the idea of changing the present system pertaining to trade cooperation activities within the SAARC region,” a senior industry official said at this event.