LAHORE, April 3: Sri Lankan High Commissioner Dr Wijeratne Bandara Dorakumburka has invited Pakistani manufacturers to process and manufacture products in his country for availing themselves of the facility of duty-free export to the European Union and India.

Talking to Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Shahid Hassan Sheikh here on Tuesday, he said Sri Lanka had secured access to duty-free export of 7,200 products to the European Union under its GSP Plus Scheme.

The main product categories which had vast potential in Sri Lanka under the scheme included apparel and textiles, clothing accessories, sea foods, activated carbon, artificial flowers, foliage plants, rubber-based products, tableware and bicycles. There was an ideal opportunity for Pakistani manufacturers who could do 25 per cent value addition in Sri Lanka, he said.

He said the Pakistani businessmen could also explore diverse opportunities available in Sri Lanka to manufacture products for exports to India under the Indo-Lanka Free Trade Agreement. Sri Lank had the most liberalised investment regime in the Southeast Asian Region, he said, and incentives and investment opportunities had no parallel. —Reporter