Chairman of Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (Sindh and Balochistan Zone) Khawar Noorani has urged the government to support and save traders of imported synthetic textile raw material by reinstating 7 percent duty on yarn in order to pass on the benefits to weaving and knitting industry.
In a communiqué issued to Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, PYMA Chairman, while referring to an advertisement appearing in the press in which appeal has been made to impose 20 percent Regulatory Duty on polyester yarn and fabric, stated that Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (PYMA) is the sole body representing the yarn trade so the Ministry of Commerce must take serious notice of this misleading appeal by a fictitious group based.
He was of the view that the correct forum for remedial action against dumping is National Tariff Commission. The local polyester yarn manufacturers (Gatron and Rupali) have already filed an application with NTC and investigation has been initiated last month. He said that PYMA is vigorously defending the interests of yarn importers and local weaving knitting industry. "We intend to prove that there is no injury to the local producers of polyester filament yarn because of imports of yarns from China and Malaysia. The real reasons why the local manufacturers of polyester yarn are suffering is because their plants are outdated and do not have the economies of scale. Consequently, they produce bad quality substandard yarn at a high price", he added.
Khawar Noorani stated that no weavers or knitters want to make his basic raw material expensive by asking for Regulatory Duty. As far as the import of fabric is concerned, local weavers do have legitimate concerns but the solution is not regulatory duty. The fabric which is being imported and is hurting the local industry is actually the Indian Origin fabric which was banned but due to the corruption, these goods were being allowed to enter Pakistani markets on the pretext that the origin was either Dubai or China.
In order to solve the problems facing the industry, PYMA Chairman suggested that National Tariff Commission is the only right forum to address the issues of dumping. He is of the view that regulatory duties may solve the issue temporarily but they always cause distortions and create bigger problems in the long run
He suggested that fabric imports from Dubai should be put on the negative list as there were no weaving/knitting factories in Dubai hence, the Indian origin fabric was simply being routed via Dubai. Khawar Noorani recalled that the textile package was envisioned by the Government of Pakistan in 2005 in which it was agreed by all stakeholders that in order to bring fabric trade under legal umbrella, the maximum duty on fabric should not exceed 15 percent and the duty on yarn was fixed at 7 percent. Over a period of years, the duty on yarn has been raised to 11 percent, causing distortions and making raw material for the downstream industry more expensive, he noted, and suggest the government to restore 7 percent duty on yarn.-PR.
Comments
Comments are closed.