Businessmen facilitation, information sharing can boost Pak-Vietnam trade: Envoy.

LAHORE -- Ambassador of Vietnam Nguyen Tien Phong said on Monday that in order to increase bilateral trade volume, Vietnam and Pakistan needed to facilitate business people and share trade information for which Vietnam Embassy in Islamabad and Consulate in Karachi were always ready to help and facilitate Pakistani businessmen.

Talking to LCCI Senior Vice President Zafar Mahmood Chaudhry and Executive Committee members here at Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), the Ambassador shared history of Vietnam Diplomatic and Economic relations; what frameworks should be in place for economic cooperation; trade statistics; and the implementation process.

He said that last year, Vietnam and Pakistan had celebrated 50 years of relations, adding that Pakistan had always supported Vietnam in all the international forums. 'We should go ahead with our relations by boosting our economic ties. We have a mechanism in place like meetings every year. We have setup sub-committees as we are partners in difficult times. We should be partner in prosperity,' he maintained.

The Ambassador said that he wanted to bring Vietnam businessmen to Pakistan to explore huge trade and investment potential of Punjab especially Lahore. He mentioned that 90 percent of cotton and 60 percent of yarn was being imported from Punjab. While Vietnam exported fisheries, tea, paper, chemicals, ginger and other products to Pakistan which were not more than 0.5 percent of the total exports. Similarly, Vietnam also imported pharmaceuticals, cotton, leather products from Pakistan, the volume of which was also very low.

He said that the embassy could also assist to find potential business partners for Pakistani businessmen, and LCCI should also send a business delegation to Vietnam to meet their counterparts and 'we can also arrange meetings with ministers and high-ups in Vietnam.'

Nguyen Tien Phong said, 'We have seen that Pakistan is facing difficulties and containers are stuck at ports but we have solution to this issue also as we can work out to develop a mechanism of barter trade between the two sides.' Upon which LCCI SVP agreed and said that he would personally lead a delegation of businessmen to Vietnam to explore trade and investment opportunities.

LCCI Senior Vice President Zafar Mahmood Chaudhry said that Vietnam and Pakistan enjoyed more than 50 years of sound diplomatic relations that were formally established in 1972. Besides excellent diplomatic ties, both countries...