ACCI welcomes Pakistan’s move to establish a legal barter system

The Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce and Investment (ACCI) on Saturday welcomed Pakistan’s move to establish a legal mechanism to provide for barter trade with two sanctions-hit neighbors — Afghanistan and Iran.

The decision was taken at a meeting of Pakistan’s Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) on Thursday.

The ACCI said the adoption of the mechanism would be effective in preventing the smuggling of goods between the two countries.

“We are in favor of legal trade and good trade relations and mutual respect both with the countries of the region and with the whole world,” said ACCI deputy chief Mohammad Younus Mohmand.

Economists believe that improving trade and economic relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan are key to increasing imports and exports between the two countries.

“If the Pakistanis use honesty in these matters, it is a big step, which is in fact a regional move, and it can be a good help in strengthening the Afghan economy and building trust in the Afghan economy, and it is not an easy step,” said Sayed Massoud, an Afghan university lecturer.

According to an official statement issued by Pakistan, the meeting, presided over by Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin, focused on a commerce ministry’s summary for “grant of regulatory support for establishing barter trade arrangements with Afghanistan and Iran”.

After discussions, the consensus “allowed regulatory cover to barter trade arrangements by amending relevant provisions” of the export and import policy orders.

Trade between Pakistan and Iran has stagnated for more than a decade mainly due to US sanctions on Tehran, while Pak-Afghan formal trade has suffered in the absence of a banking system in Afghanistan and Washington’s decision to freeze Afghanistan’s foreign reserves.

As a way out, the Quetta Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Iran’s Zahidan Chamber of Commerce and Industry signed an agreement in November last year for a barter trade mechanism. Subsequently, other chambers of the two countries were also brought into the same system.

The same mechanism would also be replicated with Afghanistan given its heavy reliance on Pakistan for essential commodities, Dawn News reported.