DHAKA, Aug 13: Bangladesh Commerce Minister Altaf Hossain Chowdhury inaugurated 3rd Pakistan Date Show in Dhaka, which was organized by Pakistan’s Export Promotion Bureau in collaboration with its High Commission. Eight Pakistani Date exporters are exhibiting their products in the show.

The minister was very impressed by the quality and processing facilities of dates. He assured to look into reducing import duty on Pakistani dates to make them competitive in Bangladesh market.

A Pakistani date processing company is interested in joint venture with some Bangladeshi company to produce date juice, date jam, marmalade & syrup. The minister instructed to look into prospect of joint venture.

Pakistan is among top 4-5 Dates producing countries, which produces more than 7,50,000 tons of dates, 11 pc of global production.

Pakistan can supply dry and fresh dates. Today it is second largest exporter of this fruit in the world. Major buyers are Canada, the US, Germany, UK, Denmark, Australia, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Dubai, Japan, China, South Korea and North Korea etc.—PPI