Says Minister Abdul Razak Dawood of Pakistan in Seoul

Minister Abdul Razak Dawood for Commerce, Textile, Industry & Production and Investment of Pakistan interviewed by The Korea Post media

A joint discussion on a roadmap of Preferential Trade Arrangement (PTA) was held between Pakistan and South Korea to beef up bilateral trade, investment and bilateral economic relations.

Minister Abdul Razak Dawood of Pakistan for Commerce, Textile, Industry & Production and Investment visited Korea in a two-day tour with an eleven-member delegation on Aug. 1-2, 2019, and met with Minister of Trade, Industry & Energy Sung Yun-Mo and leaders of important Korean business organizations and companies.

With bilateral trade of over US$1 billion during the last five years, Korea has become an important trading partner of Pakistan in the Asia Pacific region.

However, Pakistan's exports to Korea have declined from US$325 million in 2014-15 to US$275 million in 2018-19 while imports increased from US$325 million to US$818 million during the same period, showing a trade imbalance of US$543 million in favor of Korea.

Minister Abdul Razak Dawood (left) with Executive Vice Chairman Choe Nam-suk of The Korea Post media (right)

“Korea is a very important economic partner of Pakistan but our export is in decline and it is primarily due to higher tariffs and non-tariff barriers faced by Pakistani goods compared with its key competitors,” said Minister Abdul Razak Dawood during an interview with The Korea Post media. He stressed that such a situation occurred due to a lack of communication between the two countries and that he is willing to make a new and better relationship starting from this year.

In this regard, he plans to visit Korea again after the summer break during October to discuss further development on the PTA or even FTA.

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