Pakistan Textile Exporters Association (PTEA) Chairman Ajmal Farooq speaking on Monday said that textile exporters remain deprived of liquidity as a major part of their working capital remains blocked in refund cycle and under financial duress so much so that it seems impossible to achieve target of enhancing the country’s export by 2 to 3 billion by June 2018.
He also mentioned that the Prime Minister’s Trade Enhancement Initiatives are a positive move but a lack of funding would result in failure of getting the desired output. Citing an example, he said that due to insufficient releases of funds, half of the incentives of Textile Policy (2009-14) are yet to be disbursed. While sharing details, he said that claims of Rs10,300m remain outstanding against export finance markup support, Rs1,500m against markup rate support, Rs19,405m against technology up-gradation fund Rs7,431m are outstanding against Drawback of Taxes & Levies (DLTL).
Moreover, a large number of claims of incentive schemes under existing textile policy (2014-19) remain unpaid. He said the blockage of funds was a major cause for the continuous drop in exports and that the textile industry is unable to tap its potential in accordance with capacity. The authorities should accelerate the process of paying out billions of rupees in outstanding tax refunds to attain maximum industrial growth and a significant increase in exports, he demanded.
Naeem mentioned that value-added textile sector is the backbone of the economy with an enormous potential to earn foreign exchange but around 54 pc of the country’s exports and 42 pc employment heads towards disaster because of declining trend in the exports. He requested the government to take notice of the situation and step-up the exports of the country by resolving the liquidity issues through immediate payment of stuck up amounts in refund regime.
