LAHORE: The All Pakistan Textile Mills Association group leader and former chairman Gohar Ejaz has said the textile and clothing exports are on declining trend since last three years.
“The textile exports were around $9 billion when my group took over APTMA in 2009 and we raised it to around $14 billion,” he said and expressed his disappointment over reversal of exports to $10 billion now mainly due to high cost of energy being provided to the industry.
“We are closing the year 2015 on a very sad note, as the government not seems interested in the viability of the industry. What bothers me the most is that each drop of billion dollar exports is resulting to the retrenchment of one million jobs in the industry,” he stressed.
He said despite having GSP plus status, during FY 2014-15, Pakistan’s total exports are dropped by $1.21 billion i.e. 4.88 percent in value terms, mainly due to under performance of manufacturing sector.
“From July to November this year, exports have further declined by 13.81 percent i.e. $1.37 billion worth of exports loss has been incurred only in first five months over previous fiscal year,” he added.
He said the exports potential of closed mills and impaired capacity is $4 billion within the textile industry value chain, which is needed to be arrested.
He further apprehended if the immediate measures to restore viability were not taken, the manufacturing sector will collapse.
On the occasion, APTMA Punjab Chairman Aamir Fayyaz has apprehended that the GDP growth target likely to be massively missed due to dismal state of affairs of textile industry as well as agriculture sector.
“For the fiscal year 2015-16, the government has envisaged 5.5 percent GDP growth, comprising 6.4 percent industrial, 3.9 percent agriculture and 5.7 percent of services sector,” he added.
He was speaking at a meeting with the representatives of Lahore Economic Journalists Association (LEJA) at a lunch hosted by the Senior Vice Chairman APTMA Punjab Syed Ali Ahsan on Monday afternoon. The APTMA patron-in-chief Gohar Ejaz, besides senior leadership attended the event.
