PRIME Minister Imran Khan in his address asked overseas Pakistanis to remit more to improve country’s balance of payment. This has prompted me to point to a good source of foreign exchange earning that is greatly untapped.

Pakistani seafarers working on foreign vessels have been a source of substantial foreign exchange in the past. At its peak in the early 1990s their share was over 25 per cent in home remittances by overseas Pakistanis.

There were about 18,000 seafarers serving on foreign vessels at that time. A large number of these seafarers were the product of a private foreign shipping company. The company ran floating academy and also used its ships to train seafarers.

Unfortunately, this company went out of business in early 1990s. This did not affect seafarer’s employment as they secured jobs in other companies, but the training of new seafarers stopped to a great extent.

As the number of trained seafarers reduced, so did their contribution to home remittances. At present, it may be hardly a few million dollars yearly only.

With a little effort this trend can be reversed, and we can increase the number of our seafarers working on foreign ships to its glory days. Once this is achieved, they will be bringing home over a billion dollars yearly. A substantial part of this money will be available for investment, as seafarer’s rate of saving is high.

Therefore, seafarers’ contribution to the economy is two-pronged: not only do they bring the much needed foreign exchange, their savings are available for investment.

Little or no investment is required to train new seafarers. It can be achieved with the available resources, if the policies are correctly drawn.

Muhammad Mohsin Zaidi
Karachi

Published in Dawn, August 28th, 2018