KHYBER: Prolonged closure of Torkham border and subsequent suspension of trade with Afghanistan have dealt a heavy blow to trade activities in LandiKotalbazaar, with traders declaring it the worst business slump since last October.
In the historical Landi Kotal Bazaar, locally known as Sarai, a large part of the local population has lost major sources of earnings due to the continuous border closure.
Famous for the traditional mutton karahi and seekh tikka among food lovers, the bazaar also used to attract customers from across the country for genuine imported goods brought in from Afghanistan until the mid-1970s.
However, the shifting of businesses by local traders to Bara in late1970s reduced the Landi Kotal Bazaar to a localised market and thus, catering to the demands of local population, a handful of government employees and security personnel with their families stationed in the nearby British era army camp.
Trade activities in the Landi Kotal Bazaar were historically linked to trade with Afghanistan, while pedestrian movement on both sides of the border was also a major source of legitimate earnings for local traders and shopkeepers, accordingto draper Yarmat Shah.
He told Dawn that despite the shifting of trade of imported goods to Bara in late 1970s, the Landi Kotal Bazaar (Sarai) remained a busy trade centre with customers from the borderingtowns of Afghanistan too visiting them for purchasing consumer items.
‘We relied heavily on the open Torkham border as it was one of the busiest crossings with volume of bilateral trade reaching the highest annual mark of $2.5 billion in 2015-16, while the local shopkeepers, too, benefited from the thriving cross-border trade,’ he said.
Haji Sharab Gul, a wholesale dealer in food grains and flour, told Dawn that his sales had plummeted by almost 50 per cent since the closure of Torkham border, with most of his customers either unable to come to Pakistan due to visa restrictions or the locals losing their buying power with sudden loss of their sources of income.
He said that with a drastic drop in businessactivities those days, the Landi Kotal Bazaar wore a deserted look after midday, with most traders preferring to go home instead of uselessly staying in the market.
The trader said that he would sell rice and pulses to his Afghan customers in large quantities who would then take these edibles onward to Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and even to Ukraine and thus, earning him handsome profits which were now lost altogether due to border closure.
Bilal Khan, a general store owner, said that the number of his customers had shrunk considerably with only a limited number of local buyers approaching him for items of daily use and that, too, of urgent need with comparatively low prices.
Ibrahim Shinwari