ISLAMABAD: Mayor Bahawalpur Aqeel Najam Hashmi visited the Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry and held a meeting with President Sheikh Amir Waheed, Vice Presidents M Naveed Malik Senior and Nisar Mirza to explore prospects of public-private partnership for focusing on youth development. He said promoting youth was a priority area of his interest as the youth was a great asset of the country and new opportunities for youth entrepreneurship and youth employment could be created with the cooperation of the private sector.
Aqeel Najam Hashmi congratulated ICCI for successfully organising business opportunities conference and awards ceremony in the last week of June at Istanbul, Turkey and hoped that this initiative of Chamber would help in further improving bilateral trade between Pakistan and Turkey. He apprised the local business community of the development activities undertaken by Bahawalpur MCI and shared with them his future plans.
Speaking at the occasion, Sheikh Amir Waheed, M Naveed Malik and Nisar Mirza said that close cooperation of the local government was essential for smooth growth of business activities. He said that most of the issues of the business community were related to the local governments due to which their role was important to resolve issues and create a conducive environment for trade and industry.
Sheikh Amir Waheed said that youth development was the key priority of ICCI and the Chamber has taken many initiatives for youth development. He said ICCI has constituted a Yong Entrepreneurs Forum (YEF) that works on various youth promotion activities. He said Chamber has also signed MOUs with local universities to promote industry-academy linkages and foster entrepreneurship culture in youth so that youngsters instead seeking jobs could start their own business and create jobs for others. He assured that ICCI would cooperate with local governments including Bhawalpur MCI in initiatives aimed at youth development.
