STATE TO CONTROL 70 PCT OF PAKISTAN TEA IMPORTS
Pakistan announced a new tea import
policy, saying 70 pct of imports will in future be made through
the state Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP).
   Commerce Minister Mahbubul Haq said in a television
broadcast that no more than one-third of the remaining 30 pct
allocated to the private sector would be permitted to come from
any one country.
   The new policy was announced some three months after the
government suspended import licences and ordered an inquiry
into tea purchase policy.
   Traders said the move was designed to put pressure on Kenya,
which provided some 48 pct of Pakistan's 75-80 mln kilo annual
tea imports, to buy Pakistani manufactured goods in exchange.
    Liptons and Brooke Bond, two units of Britain's Unilever
Plc, control 95 pct of Pakistan's hard-pack tea market, traders
said.
   Haq, who is also Planning Minister, was outlining a new
three-year trade policy from the start of financial 1987/88 on
July 1.
 Reuter
