ISLAMABAD
The Pakistan and Canada have reaffirmed their commitment to remain constructively engaged to further reinforce bilateral relations, as there were a number of sectors that had a huge potential for cooperation, especially the export of skillful manpower to improve the national economy.
These views were discussed in a tripartite meeting of the All Pakistan Business Forum (APBF), Punjab Board of Investment & Trade (PBIT) and Member Parliament of the House of Commons of Canada Ms. Salma Zahid, held here today, to discuss various trade opportunities between Pakistan and Canada with major focus on export of skilled labour force from Pakistan.
Salma Zahid, who is also the Member Standing Committee of Immigration and Citizenship of Canada, has recently been awarded with the Pakistan civil award of ‘Sitara-e-Quaid-e-Azam’ for her remarkable services to enhance bilateral relations between the two countries.
The Member Parliament of the Canadian House of Commons emphasized Pakistan’s deep appreciation for its relationship with Canada and its commitment to fostering enduring and multifaceted bilateral relations. She stressed the importance of increasing trade between the two nations and called for closer collaboration among business communities. Promoting bilateral cooperation across public, commercial, and parliamentary spheres was highlighted as pivotal to strengthening the Pakistan-Canada partnership.
Ms. Salma Zahid expressed gratitude to APBF and PBIT for inviting her and said that Canada and Pakistan have all the resources for business collaboration and export of skilled workforce. She pledged to return with different new ideas of JVs, collaborations and export of demand base skilled workforce to boost the bilateral trade ties.
APBF President Maaz Mahmood added that business community of both the countries should collaborate with each other to force joint ventures in view of increasing bilateral trade and exploring new business opportunities. “We can start it through segment wise and APBF have all the resources to initiate it because we contain diverse kinds of members from different business sectors.”
He said that Pakistan is the 5th largest country of the world in terms of population with a large pool of human resource, pledging to equip its manpower with the latest skills and knowledge to improve their prospects of their export to potential markets.
Maaz Mahmood called for harnessing the potential of a substantial Pakistani workforce to realize the goal of fast economic revival. He proposed the Canadian government to employ a substantial number of Pakistani workers, as it has the ability to export one million workers every year to various potential markets and all possible efforts should be made to realize this goal to strengthen the economy.
