April 28, 2007	Saturday	Rabi-us-Sani 10, 1428

ISLAMABAD, April 27: Pakistan will save Rs200 to Rs250 billion per annum in the wake of drastic reduction in overall trade-related transport and logistic costs, which would also increase competitiveness of exportable products.

Of these, savings would be in the range of Rs115 billion to Rs145 billion per year in highways, trucking and railways; Rs27 billion in ports and Rs75 billion in trade logistics as a result of effective implementation of national trade corridor initiatives in the country.

Presenting a paper on National Trade Corridor Challenges: vision to implement at the Pakistan Development Forum, World Bank representative Amer Z. Durrani proposed to policy makers to build the human resource capacity in the private sector for making efficient and to enlarge Pakistan’s logistics services industry and to bring trade internal practices up to global standards.

He said that Pakistan had three major logistic challenges — domestic transport, IT development and contemporary in house logistics. He said Pakistan’s image as a poor supplier and processor are a combination of production and supply problems.

Extra pressure on logistics is expected to compensate for delay in production and poor quality control. Resultantly, Pakistan has a poor add on index, which implies fewer opportunities when buyers make where to buy decision, he added.

Member Planning Commission Dr Asad Ali Shah in his presentation proposed a range of measures for highways modernisation. This includes enhancing capacity of north-south and allied national highways, commercial management of north and south highways and introduction of intelligent transport system.

For trucking modernisation, he proposed to effectively control overloading, replace obsolete 2-axle and 3-axle rigid trucks, encourage introduction of modern prime movers etc.

He also proposed a range of measures for railway restructuring and modernisation. This mainly includes establishment of freight business unit, commercial rail environment, introduction of private sector management etc.

Chairman Central Board of Revenue Abdullah Yousuf informed the conference that development of Pakistan automated commercial community system by his organisation will be a virtual trade platform and clearance system connecting all stakeholders in a paperless environment.

He quoted a range of policy measures, including tariff measures to reduce the cost of doing business at ports and substantially reduce the cargo clearance period to five hours from seven days.

Chairman Pakistan International Freight Forwarders Association (PIFFA) Babar Badat sought support in terms of adequate funding and tax benefit for the freight forwarding industry. He proposed that all the matters concerning logistic and transport should be brought under one ministry.