Pakistan - Turkey FTA impacts upon bilateral trade
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ISLAMABAD: (APP) Pakistan and Turkey's sixth round of the negotiations on Free Trade Agreement (FTA) would be held through digital video meeting in coming week.
The agreement in this regard would be signed in coming months of April 2017.
Both the sides hold discussions on agreement on goods,services and on investment.
Pakistan's trade balance started decreasing at annual rate of 19 percent after that additional duties imposed by Turkey in 2011, said a senior official from Ministry of Commerce, while talking to APP here on Friday.
She said that Pakistan's exports declined from US $ 873 million in 2011 to $ 311 million in 2015 because of additional duties imposed by Turkey on its foreign imports on all countries including Pakistan .
The official said that Pakistan's major exports to Turkey are denim PET,ethanol, Cotton yarn,fabric and rice,garments, leather,carpets, surgical instruments,sports good,chemicals.
Pakistan's major imports from Turkey are manmade textiles, towels,steel structure,tanning and plastic chemicals, processed milk and whey,she said.
Replying to a question,she said that additional tariff imposed by Turkey have a targeted impact on Pakistan's major exports,adding that Turkey levied additional duty on 1880 products as same as Pakistan's top 205 exports to turkey face additional duty.
She added that Pakistan impose Regulatory Duty (RD) on 1312 products,Turkey has exports to pakistan in 261 of products that face RD.
This constitutes 17 percent on Turkish imports into Pakistan.
"Before the additional duty imposed, Pakistan have positive trade balance with Turkey, and after the signing of new FTA with Turkey both the coutries will have again the same positive trade balance.
Significant progress was made during the earlier negotiation on FTA between Pak-Turkey on all these agreements,the official said.