India has welcomed Pakistan's efforts to liberalise bilateral trade and said the move would open business opportunities by providing market access to Indian goods in the neighbouring country. Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said in a press release that this development reaffirms the commitment of both the governments for trade normalisation.

He said flourishing trade is the biggest confidence building measure among any two nations. Mr Sharma added the move will mark a dramatic shift in the lines that can be traded as now almost 90 per cent items can be traded with Pakistan as opposed to 17 per cent earlier.

Pakistan on Wednesday unanimously approved a proposal to switch over to a negative list regime for trade with India. It also decided to phase out the negative list by the year-end as part of measures to fully normalise bilateral economic ties.

The move will allow Pakistan to import some 6,800 items from India. At present, Pakistan allows import of only 1,946 Indian items, listed in the positive list.