June 18, 2006	Sunday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 21, 1427

KARACHI, June 17: Pakistan and Yemen have bright prospects for increasing their two-way trade as both the countries could easily meet each others needs by enhancing economic cooperation in all sectors.

Honorary Consul General of Yemen Dr Mirza Ikhtiar Baig speaking at a select dinner gathering arranged by Ijara Financing Inc. (IFI) on Friday said that the two countries should also extend cooperation in the field health, education and professional training.

He informed the participants that there was a huge order from Yemen for import of 37 million sacks (empty), rice and cement and Pakistan was already exporting yarn, fabric, surgical and sport goods, dairy products, home appliances, foot-wears and pharmaceuticals.

However, he said the trade volume between the two countries was still very low as Pakistan was only exporting $58m against Yemen’s total annual import of around $11-12bn.

Dr Baig said that there was a greater need to explore the Yemeni market with fresh vigour as it offered a lot of opportunities in trade and business.

Similarly, he said Pakistan can benefit from oil and gas reserves of Yemen as during next five years the industry’s demand for oil and gas would witness a massive increase which could be met through imports from Sanna.

Yemen has four special vessels to carry LNG and a special terminal is being built at Port Qasim to handle such vessels, he added.

“Several textile mills in Sanna have closed down owing to lack of management expertise and they are seeking cooperation from Pakistani experts and entrepreneurs to run them,” Dr Baig disclosed.

A similar offer was also received from Ethiopia where textile units were closed, he added.

Yemeni people, he said, are enterprising and even today they hold most of businesses in the Middle East and are very good in trade and business, therefore, when we talk about Yemen it does no mean one country but the entire Arab world as they are spread in most of the Gulf and Middle East countries.

IFI managing director Farrukh Ansari in his address of welcome appreciated the services of Dr Baig in promoting the trade and industry in the country.

Mr Ansari said that IFI was a funds arrangement house and its prime objective was to cater to the financial needs at corporate level covering Islamic and non-Islamic modes of financing.

Justice (Rtd) Saleemulzaman Siddiqui, Zafar Iqbal, S M Muneer, TCP chairman Asif Zaman Ansari, Sheikh Manzar Alam, Gulzar Feroz, Mian Zahid Hussain, Sharifuddin Memon of CPLC and diplomats from Poland and Iran were present on the occasion.