The share of the textile exports in overall exports of the country in February 2008 decreased to 48.6 percent from 64.5 percent in February 2007, according to a source in the Federal Ministry of Textile.
Talking Business Recorder here on Monday, he said the government's export target for 2007-08 was 19.2 billion dollars, whereas the declining trend of the share of textile exports in the country's overall exports was indicative of the fact that the country might miss the set target.
In July-February 2007-08, the textile exports were worth 6.4 billion dollars as compared to 6.7 billion dollars in July-February 2006-07, he added. He said: "This shows a decrease of four percent. The export of synthetic fiber for July-February 2007-08 was 0.3 billion dollars as compared to 0.2 billion dollars in the same period of the last fiscal year. "The industry argues that according to a rough estimate, the cost of production in Pakistan is 12 percent higher than the regional competitors," he added.
He said the government believed it had supported the sector for long and provided it enough support to be able to show growth in international markets, but the sector had failed to perform well because of its intrinsic deficiencies.
"Textile representative associations, on the other hand, have pointed out that the government structure in Pakistan is not helping the sector as other governments in the region are," he added.
"The Textile Vision 2005 was not a perfect document since it had several shortcomings to be a strategic one, but it was quite a good start. The government should have continued its efforts and further developed its strategic plan.
"It was unfortunate for the sector that the document failed to gain attention for implementation and remained a little more that a good addition to bed-time storybooks for the industry, so that the industry can have sweet dreams," he said.
He said: "Now the industry in Pakistan is getting a wake-up call from all sides, including external business challenges emerging because of globalisation of markets and internal challenges like shortage in production of local cotton, rise in bank interest rates and power shortages, are only a few to mention.
"The industry is beyond the point to think that which of these challenges is more severe or should be answered first since both the internal and external challenges are critical for the survival of the industry and must be tackled simultaneously," he opined.
He said the Ministry of Textile was developed a few years ago, but the only visible achievement by the ministry was a burden added on the exchequer. "The industry is still waiting for a textile policy they hope will solve their problems," he added.
He went on to say: "One should not be painting a bleak picture. But looking in the mirror is something all of us should do before going out to start the day's work. Statistics show that the share of textile exports in the overall exports of the country has decreased by 11.2 percent in July-February 2007-08 to 56.6 percent from 63.7 percent in July-February 2006-07," he added.
He said: "The Ministry of Textile has not been able to deliver a good policy, because it has not followed the correct process for policy development. It is unfortunate that our planning department has been stuck with command-and-control paradigm for such a long time - that they cannot shake themselves out of it.
"Proposals for developing a policy document are submitted by stakeholders every year before the policy announcement, but these documents are not really read. The ground realities in today's world have shifted a long way.
"Developing a successful policy in today's complex business world is not as simple as it used to be. It is not as simple as issuing a command and expecting every one to obey it," he said.