LCCI delegation to attend Chinaplas trade fair

LAHORE - The LCCI Executive Committee Member and President Katarbund Industrial Estate Syed Mehmood Ghaznavi would lead 11-member LCCI delegation to China from May 18 to 21 to take part in Chinaplas 2009.
Chinaplas has become a distinguished meeting and business platform for plastic and rubber industries and has also largely contributed to their prosperous development. At present, Chinaplas is not only the largest plastics and rubber trade fair in Asia, it is also widely recognised by the industry as the third most influential exhibition in the world.
Its significance is surpassed only by K Fair in Germany, the world’s premier plastics and rubber trade fair, and NPE in USA, the second largest plastics fair in the world.
The delegation, comprises M Shoaib, Iqbal Beg Chughtai, Sohail Akbar, Sh M Afzal, Rizwan Aslam, Ijaz Ali, Qamar Uz Zaman, Liaqat Ali, Ghulam Farooq and Chaudhry Wajid Ali, would also visit the various Chambers and other trade organisations in China. Delegation would also have one-to-one meetings with their Chinese counterparts. Syed Mehmood Ghaznavi said that Pakistan is lucky to have skilled and cheap labour and the other positive point of the plastic industry is that it is close to the export markets. The industry has potential to enjoy mass production and meet the export commitments if some certain incentive and relaxations are offered to it.
The industry is optimistic that as soon as the plastic industry is recognised as an export oriented industry and the valid support is provided, there would be marked increase in the export of plastic goods and gradually the industry will prove to be a major foreign exchange earning industry in the non-traditional sector.
Plastic, which has become an integral part of the modern living, with an estimated consumption of 140kg per person per annum in the developed world, against the per capita consumption of 1.4 kg in Pakistan is reflecting how the country has been left behind of the pace of growth.
Almost entire raw material, i.e. 0.3 million tonnes, used in the plastic industry in Pakistan, is imported at a cost of $200 million against a negligible export of $20 million and that is, too, shrinking fast owing to in competitive cost of production.