KARACHI - Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (PYMA) has appealed to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, finance minister, commerce minister and special assistant to Prime Minister for revenue to save polyester filament fabric industry from further disaster.

Chairman PYMA (Sindh Balochistan Zone) Danish Hanif drew the attention of the government towards sinking polyester filament fabric yarn industry, stating that around 300,000 looms and knitting machines have suspended operations during the last five years, resulting in directly and indirectly affecting a total of around 5 million people.

Chairman PYMA said that the inefficient & outdated domestic polyester filament yarn industry does not fulfill even 25% of the total demand of Pakistan. Polyester yarn (PFY) attracts 12% custom duty versus Polyester Fibre which attracts only 7% custom duty whereas the raw material and the quantity of inputs to produce both are exactly same.

He said polyester fiber is consumed by corporate sector versus polyester yarn in SME sector. In addition, local PSF production is enough to suffice Pakistan’s requirement whereas production of polyester yarn is only 25% of the required quantity for Pakistan, still import duty of PFY is at 12% vs polyester fiber’s 7%.

The ongoing Anti-Dumping Investigation on Polyester Filament Yarn (PFDY/PDTY) which is basic raw material for the polyester fabric is totally unjustified.

The user industry would be unnecessarily penalized even for those products which are not produced by the domestic industry. Cost for the end user would increase substantially and that would affect the weaving and knitting industry.

The domestic producers of polyester filament yarn are also lobbying to impose Regulatory Duty (RD) on the imported polyester filament yarn, which would be the final nail in coffin for the entire weaving & knitting industry.