PESHAWAR
Pakistan Railways and Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) have agreed to take joint measures to fully operational the Azakhel dry port to facilitate Pak-Afghan Transit trade and onward trade with Central Asian States.
The agreement was reached during a meeting between Federal Minister for Railways, Azam Khan Swati and delegation of Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, led by its president Hasnain Khurshid Ahamd, which was held at the Ministry of Railways Islamabad, said a press release issued here on Monday.
The SCCI delegation comprising former president Sherbaz Bilour, former senior vice president Engineer Manzoor Elahi and Chairman, the Chamber Standing Committee on Railways and Dry-port, Ziaul Haq Sarhadi.
During the meeting, the SCCI president presented a five point agenda/recommendations proposed by the chamber regarding facilitating Pak-Afghan transit trade, through Azakhel dry port, which, on the occasion, were thoroughly discussed.
The Federal Minister Azam Swati agreed with the proposals and appreciated the SCCI for presenting modalities to make fully operational the Azakhel Dry-port to expedite the process of exports proceeds through Pakistan Railways and ease difficulties of exporters.
The minister, on occasion, issued directives to implement the proposals of SCCI at earliest.
The chamber delegation thanked the minister for issuing instructions on the spot for immediate execution of the SCCI recommendations, which was highly commendable and appreciable.
Hasnain Khurshid while speaking on the occasion said FBR is willing to allow cross stuffing of transit goods at Karachi port and Azakhel port but needs the consent of federal Government/Ministry of Railways as from the Azakhel dry port transit goods will be loaded in single truck bonded carriers [which has been made procedural recently. However, he said, the system couldn’t be implemented because of not fully operationalization of Azakhel dry port.
Similarly, he said the Pakistan Railways will earn enormous revenue if the Azakhel dry port could be fully operationalized, besides, it can also generate employment opportunities.
The SCCI chief informed that KP is exporting items like furniture, mineral, marbles, matches and honey, etc but the exporters were facing lots of problems owing to unavailability of bonded carriers’ facility in Peshawar to carry these exports goods to Karachi port for onward destinations. He added this practice also damages most of the consignments at the Karachi port.
Mr Khurshid said the Azakhel dry port even after its completion hadn’t been fully operationalized as inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan in January last year, but it still lacked basic facilities and consequently, exporters were faced with enormous problems.
He viewed that the fully functioning Azakhel dry port will help facilitate Pak-Afghan Transit trade and onward to Central Asian Republics.
