LAHORE: SMEDA has assured fan industry of its support, Customs Today learnt on Sunday.
Talking to SMEDA Chief, Chairman PEFMA Azhar Aslam said the fan industry is producing on average 80 million units annually and there are 40-50 factories involved in export trade by witnessing total export of worth $40 million per annum.
The major export markets of Pakistani fans are Afghanistan, Bangladesh (BD), Middle East (ME) and the African countries.
Aslam said that there are about 420-450 fan manufacturing units in Pakistan, majority of which fall in the category of SMEs. He told that Pakistani fans are very much competitive with India and other countries in international markets but the industry is currently confronting a great challenge from Chinese fans, which may deprive us of the export market if timely measures are not adopted. He urged SMEDA to help up-grade the local fan industry by equipping it with modern technology and improving the compliance and certification systems as per requirement of the international markets.
Alamgir Chaudhry, Chief Executive Officer, SMEDA announced that the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority would help upgrade the electric fan manufacturing industry to enhance competitiveness with the regional counterparts.
CEO SMEDA decided to constitute a two-member committee comprising a member from each of the organization to evolve initiatives for meeting up-gradation’s requirements of the fans industry. He said that the committee, besides identifying technical and training requirement, would also take necessary measures to bring financial sector on aboard to fill in the financial needs of the fan industry. In this regard, SMEDA may also develop an exclusive lending scheme in collaboration with the banking industry for fan manufacturing cluster, he added. He was confident that SMEDA would be able to attract attention of the financial institutions towards fan industry by designing a commercially viable lending scheme.
Alamgir Chaudry further informed that SMEDA had also been conducting training programs and other development interventions for the fan industry in the past. He disclosed that compliance & certification is the key intervention of SMEDA’s project; “Value Addition in Industry-Cluster Development Approach” which has been included in Vision 2025 of the Government of Pakistan. It will impart significant benefits also on the fan industry, he added.
