Pakistani Chambers – Becoming One Voice for the Business Community

Kashif Shabbir Pres RCCI joint declaration
Kashif Shabbir, President of the Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, delivers a joint declaration from the All Pakistan Chamber President's conference.

After four years of efforts to bring them together, this week, through CIPE’s assistance, 20 leading chambers from across Pakistan including representation from Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FPCCI) spent two days at a conference to discuss economic challenges faced by Pakistani businesses, and business readiness to meet the challenges of economic recovery.

There are forty city chambers in Pakistan. Historically, these chambers were over politicized and biased to lobby for individual gains rather than serving the business community at large. Same was the case with the FPCCI, the only umbrella organization for business associations in the country.

CIPE’s work in Pakistan mainly focuses on building the capacity of these democratic institutions so that they can become an effective voice for business community at large.

CIPE facilitated the dialogue at the meeting, which after two days of deliberations among elected chamber presidents, produced a declaration released at a press conference. Salient points of the declaration include:

  • Chambers should become the one voice of business community
  • Policies and Laws effecting businesses should only be prepared in consultation with the business community.
  • Chambers should provide unified input in the preparation of federal budget
  • Chambers should work with the government to ensure good governance mechanisms are in place and smuggling is effectively policed.

The Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce organized the event. Its president, Kashif Shabbir, spoke for the conference saying, “We declare to cooperate with the government in the larger interest of the nation, but the government has to chalk out a strategy to combat smuggling.”

A full press report on this conference is available here: http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/the-newspaper/business/13+trade-and-industry-reject-vat-330-za-06

Published Date: March 03, 2010