LAHORE: The millers have demanded the government to announce a special tariff for the export-oriented textile industry
All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) Chairman SM Tanveer, in a statement, also asked the government to ensure zero-rating in all incidentals linking electricity tariff. He said that the textile industry cannot sustain the burden of system inefficiencies built in electricity tariff in the shape of surcharges including Neelum-Jhelum, debt retirement, equalisation and additional surcharge presently renamed as ‘tariff rationalisation surcharge’.
The Aptma chairman said that the electricity tariff for the textile industry was raised to Rs14.5 per kilowatt hour from Rs9 per kWh in May 2013, adding, “The average electricity tariff of textile industry in the region is not more than Rs10 per kilowatt.”
Tanveer pointed out that the National Elec¬tricity Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) had determined the tariff at Rs9.44 per kWh in 2014-15 and the industry was fine with it.
But, he said, the government had once again jacked it up to Rs12.20 and Rs18 respectively for off peak and peak hours per kWh with the introduction of the ‘tariff rationalisation surcharge’ by accumulating various taxes, levies and inefficiency incidentals to it.
