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.