February 28, 2007	Wednesday	Safar 10, 1428

ISLAMABAD, Feb 27: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz has said that the forthcoming Overseas Pakistanis Investment Conference (OPIC) being held in Islamabad should effectively be used to galvanise maximum number of overseas Pakistanis to invest in Pakistan.

The primer minister said this while chairing a briefing on the OPIC to be held on March 4-5 by the minister for labour, manpower and overseas Pakistanis Ghulam Sarwar Khan at the PM's House on Tuesday.

An official announcement said that overseas Pakistanis are encouraged to invest in the country because it offers attractive investment climate as borne out by the record Foreign Direct Investment of $ 3.8 billion in the country last year.

Another factor is the fact that Pakistan offers level playing field both to Pakistani and foreign investors without discrimination, the prime minister added.

He said the conference will provide an opportunity to overseas Pakistanis to benefit from investment opportunities in Pakistan and help them take advantage of the investment opportunities in the country.

The minister for labour said that a large number of overseas Pakistanis seriously interested in investing in the sectors like IT, construction, agro-farming, light engineering and services sectors, will attend the conference with an investment potential of about $3 billion.

He said that participants from 26 countries, including the US, UK, Europe, Middle East, Canada, Far East and other regions, have shown interest to attend the conference.