Pakistan has great potential to significantly enhance its exports through value-added products and government should provide soft loans to industries for purchasing required latest technology and allow duty free import of technology and machinery so that industries could step up efforts for adding value to their products.

This was observed by Mian Shaukat Masud, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) in a statement. He said over the years, the country has focused on expanding its manufacturing base to raise exports. But now is the time that Pakistan should concentrate on adding more value to its industrial products for a rapid and sustainable growth in exports.

He said Pakistan can earn much higher foreign exchange earnings by adding value to its textile and industrial products as the unit price realization for value-added products is far higher than that for low value-added products. 

ICCI President said only UAE and other Muslim countries offer tremendous opportunities of increasing export of value added food products. But for making possible fast growth of exports and realizing the dream of import substation, Pakistan will have to introduce value-addition at all levels.
 
He said the country cannot afford to miss its export growth targets year after year or continue to delay import substitution because that would weaken its external sector and make it more dependent on external debt, which will prove harmful in the long term for the economy.

Mian Shaukat Masud said that Pakistan’s exports of textiles remained mostly concentrated on low value-added products despite a rising share of higher value added textile products in global trade. Therefore, he called upon the government to support textile industry in moving up the value chain and increasing the share of high value added garments and made-ups in its export portfolio.

He said apart from textiles, there is a vast scope for value-addition in almost every industry including leather, plastic, food industries and those with export potential while value-addition in construction and engineering industry can earn a huge amount of foreign exchange.

But to realize all these benefits, he stressed that government should provide easy loaning facility to industries along with facilitating them in free import of required technology & machinery which will enable Pakistan to grab its due share of exports in international market.

He said moving up the chain of value addition in every industry will not only give a hefty boost to our exports, it will also cater to the growing domestic demand for sophisticated goods.