Pakistan replaced by India, Iran as top trade partners of Afghanistan

Pakistan and Afghanistan are no longer leading trade partners. Strong Border restrictions on both sides and declining bilateral relations are the main reasons.

Pakistan and Afghanistan used to have $2.5 billion worth of trade that has now declined to $1 billion, replacing Islamabad with New Delhi and Tehran as the biggest trade partners.

In this regard, Pak-Afghan Joint Chamber (PAJC) former senior vice president Ziaul Haq Sarhadi said that the Torkham border crossing was open for 24 hours a day since 2019 to promote Pak-Afghanistan bilateral trade, but no significant progress was made.

More than 832,000 containers of Afghan transit trade worth $33 billion used to pass through the Torkham border. However, a 30 per cent reduction in transit trade had been observed as it shifted to Iran, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

For years, Afghan traders are demanding that the process of clearing the Karachi port should be expedited. “The volume of trade annual shipments from Karachi to Afghanistan can be increased to 75,000 containers while the volume of bilateral trade can rise to Rs5 billion if their request is accepted,” Sarhadi said.

Afghanistan also wants to access India through the Wagah border, but Pakistan cannot facilitate Afghanistan due to its official policy stance and strained relations between Islamabad and New Delhi.

On the other hand, Pakistan wants free trade with the Central Asian Republics (CARs) through Afghanistan, but no agreement has been reached so far.