Second EU-Pakistan Summit — Joint Statement

The EU and Pak­istan re-empha­sised the impor­tance of a strong trad­ing rela­tion­ship and the impe­tus it can give to restore and enhance eco­nom­ic sta­bil­i­ty and pros­per­i­ty. This is par­tic­u­lar­ly rel­e­vant for Pak­istan whose econ­o­my faces immense chal­lenges as a result of the fight against ter­ror­ism. In par­tic­u­lar the cost of doing busi­ness in Pak­istan has increased con­sid­er­ably there­by adverse­ly affect­ing export per­for­mance and pover­ty lev­els. Pak­istan reit­er­at­ed its inten­tion to pur­sue export diver­si­fi­ca­tion and build addi­tion­al capac­i­ty to trade more effec­tive­ly, how­ev­er it stat­ed that its abil­i­ty to do this speed­i­ly was being ham­pered by the major diver­sion of resources to secu­ri­ty relat­ed expenditure. 

The two sides agreed that it is essen­tial to cre­ate the admin­is­tra­tive and secu­ri­ty con­di­tions which would allow invest­ment to devel­op and reverse the declin­ing trends rapid­ly. Accord­ing­ly both sides will con­tin­ue their dis­cus­sions in the con­text of the Ded­i­cat­ed Dia­logue on Trade and the Group of Friends of Demo­c­ra­t­ic Pak­istan (FoDP). The two sides agreed to enhance eco­nom­ic and trade coop­er­a­tion. This should fea­ture in the 5 year engage­ment plan.

The EU and Pak­istan have start­ed to work joint­ly towards fur­ther lib­er­al­i­sa­tion of trade in goods and ser­vices with the aim to mutu­al­ly enhance mar­ket access, in accor­dance with WTO rules and oblig­a­tions. A ded­i­cat­ed dia­logue is already under way aimed at dis­cussing ways to enhance the bilat­er­al trade rela­tion­ship, includ­ing, through a pos­si­ble free trade agreement.

The EU has start­ed explor­ing how aspects of the EU’s pref­er­en­tial tar­iff regime (GSP+) might be looked at in the con­text of the prepa­ra­tion of the next GSP Reg­u­la­tion, there­by allow­ing new ben­e­fi­cia­ries, includ­ing pos­si­bly Pak­istan, to take advan­tage of this scheme. The EU is assist­ing Pak­istan to resume its exports of fish­ery prod­ucts and will as a pri­or­i­ty car­ry out the nec­es­sary inspection.

The EU and Pak­istan are step­ping up their coop­er­a­tion in the field of trade-relat­ed capac­i­ty build­ing. To this end, the EU will increase the fund­ing for trade relat­ed tech­ni­cal assistance

Ener­gy

Both sides rec­og­nized the need to work towards achiev­ing safe, secure, afford­able and sus­tain­able ener­gy sup­plies. Both sides agree to coop­er­ate close­ly in the areas of: pro­mot­ing ener­gy effi­cien­cy and ener­gy con­ser­va­tions; devel­op­ment of afford­able clean ener­gy tech­nolo­gies; iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of new, renew­able, con­ven­tion­al and non-con­ven­tion­al ener­gy sources; tech­nol­o­gy and expertise. 

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