KARACHI: In order to create awareness about the ongoing efforts of government of Pakistan for having currency swap arrangements especially with regional countries, Ministry of Commerce (MoC) and Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP) had organised a meeting on Monday.

Officials of State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and leading exporters from all different sectors attended the meeting during which officials of SBP briefed about the current currency swap arrangements and its mechanism with Turkey and China. Zafar Mahmood, Secretary Commerce said there was a need to boost bilateral trade between Pakistan and Turkey through effective utilisation of the currency swap agreement, which need speedy implementation, which would contribute to bilateral trade with two countries.

Tariq Puri, Chief Executive TDAP said Turkey being an important trading partner of Pakistan should have leverage through swap arrangements. Ali Malik, Director SBP briefed the participants about the current mechanism of CSA with Turkey and it would be based on borrowing and lending arrangements between the central banks of the two countries.

The lenders will further be extended to the scheduled banks, which will provide necessary financing to the traders in the two countries. He said the above arrangement was necessitated because there was no liquidity available with the two countries in terms of the local currencies and neither was such deposit base available.

He opined the arrangement would help boost trade between the two countries as the same would not be constrained by shortage of foreign exchange (i.e dollars and other hard currencies). It would also reduce our dependence upon dollars, which would reduce, indirectly, the pressure upon our foreign exchange reserves.

Courtesy: Daily Times