Jawad ur Rehman Shekhria, President, Business Association for Cooperation with Pakistan (BACP), Moscow, Russia said that Pakistan has huge prospects to promote exports to Russian Federation and urged that Pakistani business community should focus on Russian market for business and exports. He said this while addressing a seminar on “how to do business with Russia” that was organized by Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry in collaboration BACP. He said that many Pakistani products including textiles, leather products, yarn, motorbikes and their parts have great potential in Russian market. He said that Pakistani pharmaceutical products have also tremendous potential in Russia that should be exploited. He said that India was dominating Russia in pharma exports, however, Pakistani pharma products were much better in terms of quality and could get more market share in Russia. He said that Russia was a big market, but Pakistan’s bilateral trade with it was just USD 570 million, which was quite negligible as compared to the actual potential of both countries. He said that Pakistan and Russia have also good potential to establish JVs in many fields including textiles, oil & gas, petroleum, defence products. He assured that BCAP would fully cooperate and facilitate Pakistani business community in exploring business opportunities Russian Federation.

Ms. Madina Tavitova Gerorgivna, Founder and Director of Russian Consultancy Company Mosyurgarant gave a detailed presentation on doing business in Russia, business registration process, tax rates and other business related matters to the business community. She said that Russia was a strong economic power and Pakistan could gain good results for its economy by developing close business relations with Russia. Addressing the seminar, Muhammad Ahmed Waheed, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry said that many Pakistani products, after getting labels and branding of other countries were entering Russia and other markets. He stressed that business community of Pakistan and Russia should be facilitated in establishing direct business linkages to promote business collaborations and bilateral trade. He said that Russia has advanced technology/machinery and it could help Pakistan in improving its economy. He said that Pakistan has great potential for investment and JVs in various sectors of its economy including oil & gas, minerals and emphasized that BACP should convince Russian investors to transfer technology and explore JVs in Pakistan in areas of interest.

Tahir Abbasi, Senior Vice President ICCI said that ICCI was planning to take a business delegation to Russian Federation and hoped that BACP would extend all possible cooperation in making its visit successful. The participants asked many questions about doing business in Russia and got detailed answers.