ISDS Case Map
SAARC
Pakistan and Sri Lanka are important partners not only in promoting bilateral trade and economic interactions but also enhancing regional economic integration through SAARC and SAFTA.
Sri Lanka’s second largest trade partner in SAARC, Pakistan, is hungry for more Lankan exports in the coming year-while also closely looking at Sri Lanka’s sugar sector for entry.
Promotion of trade among SAARC countries is one of the top priorities of the government, said Federal Minister for Finance Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar talking to Air Chief Marshal Jayalath Weerakkody High Commissioner of Sri Lanka.
The calls to boycott American goods and services in the wake of the recent resolution at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) have highlighted the fact that Sri Lanka’s export trade is heavily dependent on a narrow slew of countries.
The eight member states of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation vowed to reduce the size of their respective sensitive lists of non-tradable items and expressed satisfaction over signing of the Saarc Agreement on Trade in Services.
As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh heads for the Maldives next week to participate in the 17th Saarc summit, it is expected that he will be suggesting some mechanisms to promote a greater level of regional economic integration.
With many of its big ideas still await implementation, the eight-member South Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) countries seem to have gone for a modest agenda this time.
The last summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc), last month in Thimphu, had mandated creation of a South Asia Forum, consisting of diverse stakeholders from all member-countries to generate ideas to further links. This is now taking shape.
The South Asia Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) has so far been long on promises but short on actions. It was envisaged to raise inter-regional trade in South Asia - which is one of the world's least economically integrated regions - to $40 billion by 2015 from $11bn in 2007, shortly after it was agreed. But that now clearly remains a very tall promise.
The SAARC Chamber of Commerce and Industry has urged the South Asian countries, particularly India and Pakistan to set aside political issues and introduce free trade policy to bring prosperity in the region.
