SAARC ministers to meet in Dhaka on Thursday

Ministers from the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries are meeting on April 20 in Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, in a bid to chalk out strategies for effective implementation of the South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA).

This is the first time that a ministerial meet is being held after the treaty came into force from January 2006.

Meanwhile, a two day meeting of the committee of experts (CoE) started on Tuesday to discuss certain issues at the joint secretary level with representatives from all SAARC member countries.

SAFTA came into force after SAARC member countries namely Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Maldives agreed on the framework.

Report quoted Naindra Prasad Upadhyay, joint secretary at the ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supply, who is participating in the meeting of the CoE, as saying that the ministerial meeting will discuss as to how all SAARC countries can move effectively to implement the SAFTA framework to boost South Asian economy as a whole.

The meeting would also review the sensitive list of products, discuss about the trade in services which was not discussed during the earlier CoE meetings, said Upadhyay.

As per the provisions of SAFTA, agreed by seven member countries of SAARC, LDCs are supposed to get revenue compensation for the first four years beginning January 1, 2006. nepalnews.com pb Apr 19 06