All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) Chairman, Akber Sheikh has slammed the unprecedented six to eight hours unscheduled and unannounced power cut. "Pepco should establish a mechanism for micro-management of load shedding issues in consultation with industry on continual basis," he said in a statement on Friday.
"Pepco has not updated and taken the industry into confidence as to the necessity and schedule of the present power breakdown. Keeping the industry in dark has deprived it of predictability that is necessary for proper industrial and commercial operations," he added.
The Aptma Chairman stressed on a well-co-ordinated mechanism for electricity load shedding to be immediately put in place. He said in the aftermath of the severe energy crisis when the industry was expecting relief on the inordinately high power cost, more than 20 percent tariff hike had come as a bolt from the blue and now once again heavy load shedding had put the textile industry in deep waters. In the present scenario, the textile industry would not be able to survive, he feared, adding, already a good proportion of it had closed down.
He said Pepco had informed Aptma that load shedding would be till 23rd March, however, it continued to date with no end in sight. On the one hand, the textile industry had to operate at par with other regional competitors in the highly competitive international market and on the other it had to bear the high cost of doing business, mainly on account of high power cost, he added.
He said that if the load shedding were to continue even further, the proportion of sick units would rise above the present 20 to 30 percent level. Akber said that already operating under constraint due to short cotton crop, high mark up charges, increasing labour rates and high petroleum prices, the textile sector representing 60 percent of the nation's exports and 40 percent of employment in the manufacturing sector cannot withstand further load on it.
He said the affected industrial units being export oriented were unable to meet their export commitments on account of production stoppages due to non-availability of energy and millions of jobs of labourers are at stake. Textile sector is already suffering losses of millions of rupees due to sudden rise in the input costs, he added.
He also said that targeting the textile industry for electricity suspensions, unscheduled or even otherwise, was not a decision falling exclusively in the domain of load management. He added that the industry was seriously considering exercising the option of laying off one shift of workers to cope with the situation that has arisen on account of non-operation of mills due to electricity non-supply.
The Aptma Chairman demanded of the authorities to take notice of the situation and urged the government to accord due priority to the export oriented textile industry by ensuring smooth and uninterrupted electricity supply to it.
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