Power and gas suspension to industries: 15 percent of hides, skins worth Rs 2.46 billion damaged so far

The hides and skins could not be immediately processed soon after their collection produced on this Eid-ul-Azha because of the increasing load-shedding and suspension of gas supply to the industrial units. As a result, the skins and hides have started putrefying and so far 15 percent of them worth Rs 2.46 billion have been damaged.
Pakistan is the biggest market of the raw hides and skins in the Asia and 40 percent of the total produce is generated only on the occasion of Eid-uz-Azha. As usually, as many as 4.62 million hides (cows) and 17.38 million skins (goat and sheep) were collected on this Eid.
The average price for a single hide (cow) remained Rs 2, 200 while the skin (goat and sheep) price remained Rs 360. As such the value of hides and skins collected this year total stands Rs 10.164 billion and Rs 6.256 billion respectively, the Central Chairman, Pakistan Tanners Association, Agha Saiddain told to Business Recorder on Friday. The hides and skins should have been processed immediately after their collection so that they might not get putrefied saving the material from total damage.
The Eid fell during winter season when load shedding was on its rise while, the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) has also cut the gas supply to industrial unites including the tanneries located in and around Lahore including Kasur and Sheikhupura.
As a result, the tanneries located across the country could not process the hides and skins soon after their collection that resulted in loss of 15 percent to about Rs 2.46 billion, he added.
Further, he said the recent power and gas load shedding has caused irreparable loss to the tanning industry, which is a continuous processing industry. Saiddain further stated that skins with poor curing during collection are perishable and need to be processed on priority basis. Unfortunately, immediately after the EID the SNGPL cut down gas supply and put the tanneries in great trouble, he said.
Hides and skins if not tanned in time, will perish and it would be impossible to pay back to the poor suppliers, who collect these skins from town to town and village to village and finally are sell in hide market of Lahore from where the tanneries buy. The leather industry, a $1.220 billion industry and second largest after the textile, is at the mercy of Wapda and SNGPL.
'We have requested these authorities several times that being a continuous process industry must be exempted from power and gas load shedding so that perishable hides and skin could be saved.' He further said that a frequent breakdown in power has spoiled the leather quality, which was deemed at second number after Italy.
'The tanning industry was striving hard to achieve number one position in the world but due to frequent power and gas load shedding, we may even lose second position also, Tanners' Chairman said. He urged the government to direct the gas and electricity distribution companies to exempt the tanning industry from load shedding being a continuous process industry.