The week-long closure of gas to industrial units has resulted in stoppage of textile exports from upcountry and discontinuation of industrial productivity, rendering thousands of workers jobless. This spell of gas load shedding would continue till November 22.
Due to gas load shedding, textile printing, dyeing, processing, sizing, hosiery and textile chemicals manufacturing units have been badly hit. The labour-intensive power looms industry has also been severely hit by this gas load shedding, which is not getting supply of sized yarn due to closure of sizing units due to non-availability of gas.
Talking to newsmen, Muhammad Akram Ghouri, vice chairman of All Pakistan Cotton Power looms Association, said that more than 50,000 power looms owners had permanently closed their business due to unfavourable state of doing business, while 150,000 looms are operating partly. More than one million workers earn their livelihood from power loom industry. Due to prolonged gas load shedding, absence of electricity, shortage and black marketing of cotton and polyester yarn, and unfavourable government policies, he said, "our power looms industry has converted into sick industries, while unemployment and poverty are growing day by day".
Salamat Ali, chairman of Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers and Exporters Association (North Zone), said that seven-day gas load shedding has virtually crippled the value-added textile industry and escalated the prices of essential yarn in the market by speculators and hoarders.
He said that the prevailing crisis has broken the textile chain, which was developed with investment of the billions dollars during last fifty years. If textile processing, printing and dyeing units are closed due to non-availability, then allied vendor industry of stitching and packing units, service providers and other ancillaries automatically are closed.
Salamat pointed out that the textile industry had installed modern and sophisticated machinery, which is now being turned into scrap. He lamented that the industry was neither getting adequate supply of yarn nor it was granted loans for working capital at minimum mark-up. He strongly demanded imposition of complete ban on export of cotton and yarn and stern action against the speculators of yarn so as to normalise the yarn prices in the domestic market.
Ajmal Farooq, acting regional chairman of All Pakistan Textile Processing Mills Association, said that due to deteriorating law and order situation in the country, foreign buyers are shifting their focus on other markets and export orders have been cancelled.
"Our close competitors like India, Bangladesh and China are taking advantage of Pakistani situation, and foreign buyers are placing their export orders to our competitors. The government is still promising to review this alarming situation and lacking of concrete steps in this context, but increasing the duration of gas load shedding.
Meanwhile, the chemical factories, which supply chemicals to textile sector are also closed due to non-availability of the gas. Shahid Razzaq Sikka, president of Anjuman-e-Tajran, Fahim Mehmood Shah, chairman of Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (PYMA) Punjab-Sarhad zone, and other trade leaders have criticised 3 days' gas shutdown in Faisalabad.
They said that the textile processing mills and value-added units were also facing the brunt of gas load shedding for last 7 days including two days before Eid and 3 days during Eid holidays, but instead of supply gas to these units, the SNGPL has again clamped three days gas load shedding till November 22, which would severely hit the already crisis-hit textile industry.
They pointed out that during a pre-Eid meeting at Islamabad, Minister for Petroleum and Gas Naveed Qamar, Minister for Power and Water pervaiz Ashraf and Minister for Textile Industry Farooq Saeed had clearly assured the textile sector leaders that gas load shedding for textile processing and printing units would be observed for one day only but in flagrant violation of this agreement, the gas supply to these units has again been suspended for three more days ie from November 20 to 22, which is indeed a 'death blow' for the textile sector.
They urged the government to intervene and order exemption of the textile sector from power and gas outage forthwith, enabling the mills owners to run their units round-the-clock and increase the industrial production for domestic use and augmentation of textile exports.