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Shri Kamal Nath, Union Minister of Commerce & Industry has called upon the countries of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) to device a concrete agenda focussing on economic cooperation. “It is imperative that the SAARC countries devise a concrete, positive, workable and programme-based agenda centering around economic cooperation. The logic of mutual economic benefit must triumph”, Shri Kamal Nath said while addressing the inaugural session of the two-day SAARC Commerce Ministers Conference in Islamabad, which was chaired by the Pakistan Commerce Minister, Mr. Humayun Akhtar today. “SAARC is entering the 20th year of its existence. Our combined efforts have no doubt admittedly borne fruit in several areas. But compared to some other regional groupings, particularly in the field of trade and commerce, we have a long way to go. Two-thirds of global trade today is taking place within regional groups. The most visible of these are the EU, NAFTA, ASEAN, MERCOSUR and SACU. These groups span the five continents. Regional economic cooperation has brought unprecedented prosperity to the peoples of their constituents. In South East Asia particularly, and also to a substantial extent in Latin America, countries are making a paradigm shift from developing to almost developed standards within the span of single generation. Why should we in South Asia lag behind?”, Shri Kamal Nath asked, adding that the South Asian region with its 1.3 billion people, constitute one-fifth of the human race. “One in every five human beings on this planet is represented here. If we bring prosperity to our people, we will have achieved something outstandingly remarkable, not just on a regional basis, but on a global scale”, he said.
Shri Kamal Nath pointed out that the total intra-regional trade amongst SAARC countries was barely of the order of US $ 6 billion or so. “It is a drop in the ocean when compared to the total volume of our combined international trade of over 200 billion dollars. We should strive to forge a common platform and a common approach to achieve what is clearly a common goal”, he said.
SAARC Commerce Ministers congratulated Shri Kamal Nath on his leadership role in the WTO in the Geneva negotiations and resolved to continue their cooperation with each other to put up a united position in the WTO. Stating that the initiation of SAARC trade fairs had been a welcome development, Shri Kamal Nath invited all the SAARC countries to participate in the Sixth SAARC Trade Fair which would be held in New Delhi early next year.
The Minister said that the signing of the Agreement on a South Asia Free Trade Area in January this year at the Islamabad Summit was a milestone in the economic profile of SAARC countries. He stressed that it was a matter of regret that over 90% of the requirements of South Asian countries were still sourced from outside the region. And conversely, a major part of India’s exports were also destined for countries outside the SAARC grouping. Despite the limited concessions of SAPTA, regional trade had failed to register the kind of growth which would give us satisfaction, he said, underlining the urgent need for introspection. He expressed the hope that the SAARC Chamber of Commerce & Industry, which had been in existence for the past decade with its headquarters in Karachi, would play a little more incisive role now that member countries were embarking on SAFTA and work towards the realisation of SAFTA’s full potential.
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