Pakistan and China cooperation to forge trade gateway: senator

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2015-04-22

A tunnel under construction on the Karakoram Highway connecting Xinjiang
in China with Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan region, April 18. (Photo/Xinhua)

Two-way trade between China and Pakistan is expected to swell by 300% to 400% in the next five years along with the construction of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that connects Kashgar city in northwestern China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region to the southwestern Pakistan port of Gwadar via highways, railways and pipelines, Hong Kong's Ta Kung Pao reports, citing a Pakistani senator.

"The corridor will greatly benefit both Pakistan and China, as it involves deployments in comprehensive cooperation in the fields of manufacturing, energy, and transportation, etc," Saleem Mandviwalla told the paper when asked which country will benefit more from the project.

The senator also expected Gwadar Port, located at the mouth of the Persian Gulf in Pakistan's southwestern province of Baloschistan, to become the key gateway for Middle East transshipments to China in the coming few years.

President Xi Jinping of China is paying his first state visit for the year to Pakistan to oversee the signing of agreements pertaining to the implementation of the CPEC project, which may serve as a model for China in promoting its Belt and Road Initiative, the paper reported.

With the construction of the economic corridor, Mandviwalla said Pakistan will enjoy significant infrastructure improvement and transfer of manufacturing industries from China, thereby changing his country's economic structure. China's demand for clean energy to support the next decade of economic growth will be fully met by the new oil pipelines constructed under the project, he added.

China-Pakistan trade amounted to US$16.006 billion in 2014, with China enjoying a large trade surplus by recording US$13.248 billion in shipments to Pakistan. But Mandviwalla believes that once Gwadar becomes the gateway for shipments to China from Iran, Afghanistan and other neighboring countries, the trade imbalance will improve drastically.

Mandviwalla told the paper he believes Pakistan will eventually become the cornerstone of the trade gateway for Central Asia and the Middle East after the Gwadar-Xinjiang railways and highways are operational.