Several industrial units of North Karachi Industrial Area (NKIA) are on the verge of closure in the wake of persisting water shortage. The NKIA having more than 2500 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and about 90 per cent of them are export-oriented units, has been facing acute water shortage since advent of summer, causing production losses.
According to industrialists major units existing in the NKIA include textile, leather, flour mills, pharmaceuticals, cardboards, food and beverages, light engineering, soap, dyeing and bleaching, chemicals, packaging, marbles, matches, pottery, printing and ice factories.
Criticising the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) for its failure in resolving the lingering water issue, the industrialists regretted that although the officials of the water utility had been repeatedly requested to ensure uninterrupted water supply to the NKIA to save its industries from incurring heavy losses, no sincere efforts had been made in this regard.
The entire North Karachi industrial area which has been facing acute shortage of water has no choice but to purchase private tankers at exorbitant rates, thereby increasing production cost manifold. North Karachi Association of Trade and Industry's former chairman Abdul Rashid Fodderwala said that the industrial area was getting the supply after a gap of three days and that too with a low pressure. He suggested that the KWSB should supply water to industrial and commercial zones, instead of supplying it to tanker mafia.
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