At the end of May 2019 founding board member of CPIC Global Zeeshaan Shah addressed delegates at the Britain-Pakistan Prosperity Conference 2019 held at the London School of Economics. The agenda of this conference was to discuss Britain’s capacity to collaborate, integrate and promote prosperity and development with Pakistan.
Other key figures speaking at the event included Khalid Mahmood (Shadow Foreign Minister for Europe), Amjad Bashir (MEP) and others.
With key topics such as Brexit on the table, Zeeshaan used his extensive international experience in business to offer vital insights into industry for students and other attendees.
Pakistan – British Relations
Zeeshaan spoke about the need to enhance trade between Britain and Pakistan and covered many aspects in a brief, three-minute speech. He spoke about the challenges facing those goals and how he, and others already established in business, could help.
“Pakistan and the UK have a shared history,” he said, “and we also have Pakistani’s among the millions living here in the UK.”
“Pakistanis are part of the fabric of the UK and if Pakistan can do billions worth of business with China, I think the potential for business between Great Britain and Pakistan is even higher.”
Mr Shah also went on to state that Pakistan had a clear benefit when it came to boosting business in Britain. English is essentially a second language for Pakistanis and there are close ties with the legal systems in each country.
Of course, there are challenges and while Brexit is causing economic concern for many sectors of industry in the UK, it does offer the opportunity for non-EU countries such as Pakistan to step in and take advantage of the new financial climate.
The Role of LSE SU
The Pakistan Society at the London School of Economics Student Union seeks to boost ties between two countries in a number of ways. The nature of the studies do, however, mean that there is a focus on business and that was in evidence at the May conference.
Delegates benefited from a number of speeches at the event but the words of Zeeshaan Shah really underlined the potential for business ties between the UK and Pakistan.