Majyd Aziz
Preamble:
On April 11 and 12, 2013, CUTS International, an Indian think-tank
headquartered in Jaipur, organized a couple of day-long conferences in New
Delhi with support of Asia Foundation and AusAid. The program was to, firstly,
promote a participatory approach to address non-tariff trade barriers in South
Asian regional trade and, secondly, to achieve consensus on South Asian
regional integration and connectivity. CUTS had assembled focused participants
to discuss, deliberate, and endorse the Business Plan and South Asia Regional
Economic Integration Strategy that were presented at the two conferences. The
eight-member Pakistani delegation consisted of two representatives of
Sustainable Development Policy Institute, two from Ministry of Commerce, two
from NGOs, one from media, and the writer who represented trade and industry
and leading the delegation.
Intra SAARC Trade is Indo-Pak
Centric:
Liberalization of trade and investment, especially with reference to
SAARC countries, is primarily focused on Indo-Pakistan bilateral relations and
therefore assumes substantial importance whenever regional economic integration
is deliberated within SAARC. Trade and investment liberalization within the
Indo-Pakistan context was, is, and would generally be a very delicate affair
since this process is susceptible to non-trade factors that hold its progress
hostage.
Indo-Pakistan trade policy decisions have had a roller-coaster ride in
the last two years. The process that melted the ice began in Islamabad in April
2011 when the two erstwhile Commerce Secretaries met and agreed to a joint
declaration. Over the past two years, atleast fifteen initiatives have been
undertaken by both countries and these have led to an upsurge in trade figures.
Trade and investment process between India and Pakistan has to maintain
its own sustainability inspite of a high-low scenario where external factors
impede as well as make the progress regressive at certain times. Be it military
skirmishes at the border, be it hyper-brouhaha of hardliners, or be it the
dastardly misguided actions of extremists and perpetrators of terrorism, trade
between India and Pakistan would remain captive to them and the events. The recent
jingoistic statements, allegations of beheading of captured troops, and the
recent gruesome and fatal attacks on high profile prisoners in jails have
muddied the environment and may affect the trade process.
However, acceding to these hindrances or resigning to these compelling
reasons would throw the liberalization course back to the dark ages and hand a
victory on a silver platter to those very forces that do not appreciate a
conducive and peaceful environment. Therefore, in all sincerity, it is incumbent
upon the stakeholders, such as business community, media, scholars,
non-governmental organizations, etc, not only in the two large South Asian
neighbors, but even those in other SAARC countries, to promote the need for
India and Pakistan to go with full force towards liberalization of trade and
investment. This would, of course, also motivate citizens of these other SAARC
countries to endorse and promote the concept of regional economic integration
and, at the same pace, providing the foundation to make SAARC a strong,
meaningful, and effective organizational entity.
Notwithstanding the desire of stakeholders to enhance trade and
investment within the region, the bare fact is that there are plenty of other
roadblocks that have hampered smooth progress and continued to provide an
element of doubt and distrust. The most vitiating blockade is the blatant
implementation of Non-Tariff Trade Barriers. Today, while everyone talks of
liberalization of trade, free trade agreements, preferential treatment, and establishing
trade blocs, the fact of the matter is that new NTBs are being regularly
invented by various countries. As tariffs go down or become zero-rated, NTBs
become more prominent and prove to be largest impediments to trade. Where there
were once barriers at the borders, now NTBs have become non-border barriers.
The role of SAARC becomes very important as this organization is the
natural candidate as a focal point among member countries. The primary factor
that can unite South Asia is trade and movement of business people and strong
bonding between the business communities of member countries.
The perpetual faithfulness to discriminatory applications of rules,
regulations and laws have provided ammunition to the adversaries and opponents
of free trade to strongly agitate any relaxation in the trade policies, for
example, Pakistan granting Most Favored Nation status to India inspite of the
Pakistani Federal Cabinet’s decision in April 2012 to do so from January 01,
2013.
Institutional Mechanism:
There is an imperative need to, first and foremost, recognize that Track
II approach is workable and practical. The main advantage of this process is
that all interlocutors at various fora are serious and are more or less on the
same page on most of the contentious issues or on the methodology and procedure
of addressing these issues. There is seldom any sense of a pejorative situation
and the feeling of vacuity seems to have evaporated. This mode is not limited to prime
stakeholders such as trade and industry or even those in arts and culture,
media, social workers, think tanks, or even those who at one time or another
were involved in policymaking.
It is therefore in the best scheme of things that an institutionalized
mechanism should be developed to coordinate with all stakeholders and to set in
motion a process to disseminate data and input through a centralized clearing
house. The major reason for this approach is that a formidable movement can be
evolved that would possess the critical mass to convince the policymakers, the
naysayers, and the hardliners that progress towards liberalization of trade,
that progress towards overall peace, and that progress towards bettering the
lives of the people in the region could be possible for the mutual long term
benefit of the region. In fact, SAARC should set up a Council for NTBs if SAFTA
is to become a reality.
Notwithstanding this optimistic outlook, the fact of the matter is that
citizens in each country must also play their constitutional and fundamental
role in boosting the morale of those who are out to achieve the desired
objectives of peace, harmony, and better quality of life. American tycoon Henry
Ford very wisely stated that “coming
together is a beginning, keeping together is progress, and working together is
success.”
