Iran, Pakistan PTA Talks to Kick Off in September
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – The director general of the Trade Promotion Organization of Iran (TPOI) for South Asia announced that the first joint meeting for launching a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between Iran and Pakistan will be held in September.
Speaking in an interview with Mehr news agency on Wednesday, Hadi Talebian Moghaddam pointed to the latest situation of establishment of free trade with Pakistan and added that the two countries had established a Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) previously and effective steps have been taken in line with the removal of the existing problems.
Planning is underway for launching free trade with neighboring Pakistan, he said, adding that the talks would start within the next two months.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Talebian Moghaddam pointed to the volume of bilateral trade and put the value of trade exchanges between the two countries at between $2.3 and $2.4 billion/year.
It is predicted that trade between Iran and Pakistan will increase between 15 and 20 percent within the next year, the director general emphasized.
Pakistan has issued an integrated instruction for trade with Iran, Russia and Afghanistan, he said, noting that talks are also underway in Iran to define a new instruction for the promotion of trade with Pakistan.
