ISLAMABAD: Senior officials from Pakistan and Uzbekistan have agreed to fast-track their countries’ Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) to raise bilateral trade to $2 billion within the next two years, Pakistan’s commerce ministry said on Friday.
Uzbekistan was the first Central Asian nation with which Pakistani officials signed a bilateral Transit Trade Agreement (UPTTA) and a Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) covering 17 items. The PFA was signed between the two countries in March 2022 and became operational in 2023.
The two sides discussed the PFA again in Tashkent on Dec. 11 when Ihsaan Afzal, coordinator to the Pakistani prime minister on commerce and industry, held in-depth talks with Shohrukh Gulamov, Uzbekistan’s deputy minister of investment, industry and trade.
“Both sides reaffirmed their firm commitment to elevate bilateral trade to $2 billion within the next two years, in line with the vision of the Prime Minister of Pakistan and the President of Uzbekistan,” Pakistan’s commerce ministry said.
Gulamov confirmed that the two countries are actively finalizing a “significantly broadened product list,” stating that a formal understanding on the expanded PTA is expected “very soon.”
