Owners shifting textile units to other states

ISLAMABAD - Problems like power shortage, poor law and order situation and the high cost of doing business in Pakistan have forced the owners of textile mills to shift their businesses to other countries, TheNation learnt.
Textile sector, which accounts for 54 per cent of the countrys total exports, has been facing a critical situation for the last two years. The textile sector is facing lot of problems including long-hour power loadshedding, gas shortage, high mark rate, and law and order situation in the country.
The sources in All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA) told TheNation that the series of shifting textile units to the neighbouring countries started last year (2008). Due to the said problems, not only the textile units are being shifted from the country but also the exports of this sector are much affected which ultimately declining the overall exports of the country, sources added.
The sources told that according to the unofficial figures, some 15pc textile units had been shifted so far while majority of the remaining was also considering this option. If the situation of power and gas do not improve in the next six to eight months, the said percentage would increase up to 25 percent, the sources added.
Due to the power outage, not only the textile units are shut down but also quality is getting worsen, sources said and added that other countries were not interested now to import the textile made-up commodities from Pakistan, as they considered that Pakistan could not fulfil their orders on time.
On the other hand, the countries like Bangladesh and China are providing incentives to the textile sectors thats why the textile owners are looking to take units in these countries, sources informed.
Federal Minister for Textile Industry Rana Muhammad Farooq Saeed Khan other day also admitted in the National Assembly that the textile units had been shifted to Bangladesh. However, he said incentives introduced through new textile policy would boost this industry in Pakistan.
It is worth mentioning here that at present, textile sector is facing four to six hours loadshedding and within the next couple of months, the gas shortage might also start which would create further problems for them. Despite announcing in the recently announced textile policy that this sector would be exempted from the loadshedding, the sector is still facing it. The statistics also revealed that the export of textile sector had been on the declining side for the last two years.