April 05, 2007	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 16, 1428

ISLAMABAD, April 4: The National Standing Committee on Commerce on Wednesday approved Trade Organisation Bill 2006 aiming to abolish fake and dummy trade organisations.

The ordinance was approved in the standing committee meeting headed by MNA Iqbal Muhammad Ali Khan. It was attended by all relevant stakeholders including officials of the commerce ministry.

An official announcement issued here said that the law was formulated in consultation with all the stakeholders.

The meeting was informed that under the new law multiple trade associations in same sector had been disallowed. Territorial jurisdiction of chambers had been defined at district level.

The law allowed women entrepreneurs and service sector to form trade bodies, right of vote to trade bodies in FPCCI elections shall accrue two years after grant of licence. The right of vote to a new member in a trade body will accrue two years after grant of membership.

The meeting was informed that only business concerns and not individuals shall be eligible for membership of trade organisations. All these provisions would provide a self-run mechanism for purging the system of non-operational, non-functional, fake and ghost trade bodies, which sued to play decisive role in the election of FPCCI in the past.