Preface

The Pakistan Resident Mission (PRM) of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in association with the ADB Institute has launched a series of policy seminars for Government officials and other stakeholders in Pakistan. The seminars centre on policy issues of interest to the Government and civil society, and aim to disseminate best practice thinking in selected policy areas. The first of the series of seminars, on "Industrial Competitiveness: The Challenge for Pakistan", was held in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi respectively in November 2003. PRM is now pleased to publish the full paper on which the seminars were based in the form of an ADB Institute-PRM seminar paper.

The paper has valuable insights on the nature of industrial competitiveness, which is the ability to compete with firms at the international frontier of best practice. It provides an overview of the competitive situation facing Pakistan and compares its competitive performance with selected countries in Asia. It also benchmarks Pakistan's performance relative to other countries in the region, discusses trends in export markets and highlights the key lessons that can be derived from the recent economic history of Asian economies which have achieved spectacular success in export performance.

The authors of the paper are John Weiss, Research Director, ADB Institute and Sanjaya Lall, Professor of Development Economics, Queen Elizabeth House, Oxford University. The authors would like to acknowledge the helpful comments of Ishrat Husain, Governor, State Bank of Pakistan. The paper was edited and prepared for publication by Sara Mahmood, while the cover was designed by Cecilia Caparas at ADB Headquarters. An earlier draft of the paper was circulated within ADB and to key officials in Government and has benefited from their views and comments, as well as comments received at the three seminars. We hope that this paper generates further debate on competitiveness in Pakistan and contributes meaningfully to the literature on trade and globalisation issues in the country.

M. Ali Shah
Country Director
ADB Pakistan Resident Mission

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