Exports falling is hurting the confidence of investors:Mian Zahid Hussain

Lahore: Exports from Pakistan are steadily falling hurting the confidence of investors, hitting forex reserves and renewing fears of losing export markets, a business leader said Tuesday.

Exports are stagnant since last few years due to lack of action make the current year’s export target of 27.5 billion dollars difficult to achieve, said President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum Mian Zahid Hussain.

Speaking to the business community, he expressed fear that imports can rise above the 40 billion dollars creating problems for economy.

Mian Zahid Hussain who has also served as and Minister for Information Technology (Sindh) said that pushing exports to USD 50 billion in not difficult if some steps are taken in the right direction. He said that some elements think that spending billions on useless exhibitions, foreign tours and flowery statements can make a difference which is a deception. Those assigned for enhancing exports would waste money and later blame energy crisis to absolve themselves of all the responsibility, he said, adding that energy crisis has not worsened but reduced under the incumbent administration.

He said that TDAP has claimed to gain export orders worth 2.5 billion dollars in the last two expos, a claim contradicted by the statistics of concerned government department.

The fact remains that exports have registered a decline of five percent in the first eight months of the current fiscal, he said adding that March textile exports were over a billion dollar less than exports of March 2014. Situation can be changed by ending adhocism, promoting SME sector, establishing export and import bank, appointment of professionals on key posts and taking some unpopular decisions, said Mian Zahid Hussain.