PESHAWAR
Officials from Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa along with multiple-stakeholders have gathered to deliberate on foreign investment prospects, hurdles and gave productive proposals and way forward to address all those issues.
A roundtable conference was convened at provincial civil secretariat, with participation of senior officials from the Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Planning and Development Government of KP, and stakeholders, investors, business representatives, others. Muhammad Nadeem Rauf, Senior Vice president and Mr Muqtasid Ahsan, Secretary General of the chamber participated in the moot.
The basic purpose of the moot was to identify and shortlist viable investment proposals for inclusion in the provincial pitch book and future B2B engagements with China.
Members of SCCI from sectors such as agriculture, minerals, ICT, energy, manufacturing and allied industries are highly encouraged to participate in person and also inform relevant investors and businesses.
Participants of the meeting on the occasion, raised several concerns and challenges beyond the capacity of any private enterprise. The speakers noted that regressive and unpredictable policies such as Infrastructure Development Cess, persistent non-market factors, administrative hurdles despite compliance by businesses, NOC culture were the key factors behind flight of the capital and investment from the province. Similarly, the participants pointed out that security and restricted movement of foreigners, especially Chinese, were also major issues that are hampering investment in K-P.
SCCI officials and stakeholders stressed the crafting of a long-term investor friendly policy.
Furthermore, they emphasized pragmatic steps need to be taken to address genuine grievances of the business community.
SCCI urged the government and relevant authorities to extend cooperation to businesses to restore investor’s confidence and to transit from consumption led economy to self-sustained and export led provincial economy.
Senior government officials assured the assistance for removal of hurdles in the way of Chinese investment and also pledged to support in the upcoming SCCI’s Award Ceremony in Uzbekistan.
SVP Muhammad Nadeem chamber will share its input and proposals in the provincial government pitch book for attracting Chinese Investment in KP.
