President Ashraf Ghani has inaugurated the first Afghanistan-India air corridor a direct route that bypasses Pakistan, during a ceremony at the Kabul international airport . The dedicated air corridor was planned during the meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Ghani in Kabul in September 2016.
First India-bound flight on 19th June included 60 tons of medicinal plants and a second flight will carry 40 tons of dry fruits from the southern Kandahar province.
Afghanistan is a mountainous landlocked country and Pakistan has stymied Afghanistan’s efforts to trade with India.
After Afghanistan and Pakistan signed a transit trade agreement in 2010, Islamabad allowed Afghan trucks to carry goods up to the Indian border but barred them from ferrying any Indian goods through Pakistani territory. Afghanistan is dependent on the Pakistani port city of Karachi for its foreign trade.
The air route will now remove Pakistan from that equation. These routes and corridors are aimed at providing sea, land and air access route for Afghanistan to regional and global markets in South Asia and beyond.
According to the Afghan Chamber of Commerce and Industries (ACCI) the cost of transporting a kilogram of vegetables and fresh fruit from Kabul and Kandahar to Indian markets will be about 20 cents per kg, and the cost of a kilogram of goods from India to Afghanistan will be about 40 cents.
The volume of transaction between Afghanistan and India, according to the Afghan official, is some $500 million at present.
Earlier, in January 2015, India had announced its decision to allow Afghan Trucks to enter the Indian Territory through Atari land check post for offloading and loading goods from and to Afghanistan. India is also cooperating with Afghanistan and Iran for development of the Chabahar Port.
Later on, in May 2016, a trilateral transport and transit agreement based on sea access through Chabahar was signed in the presence of the leaders of the three countries in Tehran.
Currently major exports from India to Afghanistan are man-made filaments, articles of apparels and clothing accessories, pharmaceutical products, cereals, man-made staple fibres, tobacco products, dairy and poultry products, coffee/tea/meat and spices.
Major imports from Afghanistan to India are fresh fruits, dried fruits, nuts, raisins, vegetables, oil seeds, precious and semi-precious stones, etc.
Meanwhile, the Pakistan embassy in Kabul said in a statement on Monday that Pakistan too intends to open a transit route for Afghan exports.