KARACHI: The local industry has expressed great concern over the heavy influx of Iranian tiles and has urged the government to take effective measures to check the inflow of smuggled tiles which are not only depriving the exchequer of revenue but also posing a great threat to the local industry.
According to the All-Pakistan Ceramic Tiles Manufacturers Association (APCTMA), it has informed the government that Iranian tiles worth Rs12 billion has been dumped in the local market in just a year despite marginal revaluation by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).
The association said that the local industry was already struggling to survive in the presence of Chinese tiles while heavy influx of Iranian tiles has threatened it further.
The APCTMA cited Customs’ documents which reveal massive arrival of Iranian tiles every month, saying that a much bigger quantity had been smuggled into Pakistan.
The association informed the FBR chairman that importers had imported over 3.2 million square metres of tiles from Iran in March 2014 which was the highest ever quantity of tiles imported from one single country in a month.
The importers of Iranian tiles have chosen to smuggle the tiles from Iran in the first place but then opted to illegally import them by way of bringing in multiple truckloads of tiles on one invoice.
These smugglers keep showing just one single invoice to the customs authorities and get multiple truckloads of Iranian tiles cleared, depriving the exchequer of hundreds of millions of rupees in revenue.
Iranian traders offer a cheap rate of various types of Iranian tiles to local traders which are almost 25 to 35 per cent cheaper than local products due to massive theft of duties and taxes by the smugglers.
APCTMA said a number of tiles manufacturing units have been closed down and a few others are considering closing down their tiles making plants.
Only seven manufacturers i.e. Shabbir Tiles and Ceramics, Master Tiles and Ceramics, Karam Ceramics, Emco Industries, Sonex Tiles and Ceramics, Swat Tiles and Ceramics and Frontier Ceramics are in the competition.
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