Finance Minister Ishaq Dar is taking personal interest in pushing up exports, feeling encouraged after a recent Pakistan-Russia inter-governmental committee meeting where several Russian companies showed interest in trading with Pakistan. He doesn’t want this opportunity to be missed.

The food and commerce ministries, on his instructions, are now busy in preparing a plan for boosting farm exports to Russia.

“We should properly inform our traders that they can diversify their export destinations, taking advantage of the opportunities for agricultural exports to Russia”, Dar told officials of the two ministries in a meeting.

Russian imports of food-related commodities were worth about $39bn in 2013, about $23.5bn of which was in categories affected by the Russian ban on exports primarily to the Western market. From the countries covered by the sanctions, Russia imported $17.2bn worth of food which it will now import from other countries. Russian food safety authorities had already banned the import of Polish fruit and vegetables prior to the ban.

A delegation visiting Moscow recently found Russian officials keenly interested in Pakistani commodities and willing to extend preferential treatment to our exporters

Pakistan’s current trade with Russia is about $550m which, given the existing potential, can be further enhanced. Pakistani potatoes and citrus fruits are already being exported. There is a big demand in Russia for seafood such as shrimps, prawns and shellfish and also for hard cheese and marbled beef. It may require special expertise to win space in the Russian market.

In September, a 20-member delegation of Pakistan fruit, vegetables exporters Importers and Merchants Association (PFVA) led by Waheed Ahmed visited Russia to explore the prospects of export of fruits and vegetables in the wake of ban on imports of such items from Europe.

On return, they said they found Russian officials keenly interested in Pakistani commodities and were willing to extend preferential treatment to Pakistani exporters to have a sizable share in Russia’s $2bn fruit and vegetable market. However, their hosts were more concerned about the quarantine standards of the Pakistan companies which, they pointed out, must meet Russian quarantine standards.

However, one may note that the past record of trade ties between the two countries have not been enviable by any measure. About 15 years ago, seven trade companies had filed claims worth $76m with the Russian authorities on a trade dispute which remained unresolved. Early this year, the Russian government showed interest in resolving the dispute. In January, the prime minister constituted a committee to resolve the matter. Similarly, Russians detected larvae of Khapra beetles in rice and the golden nematode pest in potato shipments in 2013. This led to curb on the import of some Pakistani farm products, including potatoes and rice. The ban on citrus fruit was, however, lifted in December 2013.

The restrictions followed on grounds of alleged systematic violations of international and Russian Phytosanitary requirements. Pakistan had started supplying potatoes to the Russian market a few years ago. Before the ban, the country accounted for 10pc of Russia’s potato import, which reached 1.2m tonnes in 2010-2011. Russia itself produces 29m tonnes of potatoes every year. Pakistan also supplied about 28,000 tonnes of rice before the 2013 ban. According to Euromonitor International, the Russian rice market was estimated at $35.4bn.

Early this year, Russia and Pakistan signed a protocol for facilitating export of kinnow, rice and potato at a ceremony in the wake of visit of six-member Russian delegation which saw facilities and quality of Pakistani food products in various cities.

Meanwhile, Ishaq Dar has directed the ministries of commerce and national food security to coordinate in identifying exportable food products, keeping in view whether surplus quantities and requisite quarantine arrangements were available. The minister observed that quality standards should be considered in advance to ensure the success of the export plan.

Published in Dawn, Economic & Business, December 29th, 2014