KARA CHI (APP) - A meeting of FPCCI has strongly condemned further increase in power tariffs and said that reason made by NEPRA that increase is due to increase in cost of producing electricity is nothing but to crush the national economy which will result in further enhancing cost of doing business. According FPCCI here Wednesday, President FPCCI Sultan Ahmed Chawla convened this meeting at Federation House here Wednesday to discuss the recent power rates by National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA). He criticised the government and NEPRA for frequently increasing power rates and said that they have been increased up to 92pc in the last two years. Chawla said that NEPRA and OGRA do not bother to consult stakeholders before any rise in tariff. Increases burden the industries and the masses. This is injustice to local investors and this will increase the cost of local produced goods in national and int'l market and making them uncompetitive in these markets. This would make it impossible to provide locally manufactured goods in domestic markets at affordable rates and Pakistan would lose export market. The FPCCI president said that the industry was undergoing the ordeal of poor exports, high cost of business, militancy and political and economic instability. In such a critical situation the proposed increase in power tariff would prove to be a very unpopular decision. Vice President FPCCI Zakarya Usman said that this increase will be adjusted from the people as Fuel Adjustment Charges directly affecting the manufacturing units, as the manufacturing activities will come to halt and export targets cannot be achieved. He said that the decision to increase electricity tariff was apparently taken under pressure of the multilateral donors that do not want the developing countries to come out of the debt trap. Usman noted that the industry is already losing the export market whereas in local market it is facing tough competition from smuggled and under invoiced products, he said, expressing apprehensions that the proposed electricity tariff increase would prove to be a lethal blow to the domestic manufacturing sector. Vice President FPCCI Mansha Churra said the increase in electricity charges will ultimately escalate the cost of production of the industrial sector. This decision will have a bad impact on the overall economy and particularly on the large scale manufacturing (LSM) sector.