APDPA chief questions hardles towards exports

Chairman All Pakistan Dry Ports Association (APDPA) Muhammad Ishaque Butt has expressed deep concern over the blockade of bonded carrier's licences of all up-country dry ports. The abrupt action of Collector (Appraisement) Karachi played havoc to the exports and hampered logistic planning of exporters of the region.
The licenses of up-country dry ports were blocked for want of bank guarantee of Rs 5 million to cover the risk of loss of custom duties if import cargo en-route was damaged or lost, he said. Talking to media on Saturday, the Chairman was of the opinion that why exports were stopped and reiterated that export had nothing to do with bank guarantee and unjustifiably blocked. Due to the energy outage, law and order situation and rising cost of doing business, exporters were facing difficulty to manage their supply chain and to compete international and such blockade of export will result in missing of vessels and other serious repercussions which may lead to cancellation of export orders resulting huge loss to the national exchequer, he said.
The Chairman said that APDPA officials met with Chairman Federal Bureau of Revenue (FBR) and member custom to discuss the issue and despite of this no action had been taken, adding the step motherly treatment extended to up-country dry ports which played a pivotal role in development of the export culture in the country and exports were increased to manifolds.
All Pakistan Dry Ports Association had written a number of letters to FBR over very important issues and nobody dare to respond even a single letter, he alleged. Butt emphasised that the time had come to remove the double standards, adding that Pakistan Railways and NLC were exempted from bank guarantee as bonded carriers and up country dry ports being permanent establishment should be treated the same way. Under protest, he said "we have submitted bank guarantee of required amount as a result of which license has been restored and export cargo was on the track now."
Chairman All Pakistan Dry Ports Association said "on formation of new government we will meet the new Prime Minister of Pakistan Muhammad Nawaz Sharif to discuss all issues relating to up-country dry ports and issues affecting the exporters and importers of the region in the best interests of the country."