Muhammad Jawed Bilwani, the Chairman of Pakistan Apparel Forum showed his serious concerns about the declining textile exports in general and of garments sector in particular. He also demanded from the government to instantly release all the Sales Tax Refunds, Custom Rebate Claims, DLTL Claims and WHT Claims and provide relief to the textile exporters. He believes that only by doing so we can increase the exports in textile sector of Pakistan.
Stating the exports statistics for the first month of 2017, he said that exports of knitwear has declined by 3.44 percent, readymade garments declined by 3.60 percent and of all textile products declined by 1.30 percent as compared to January 2016.
He further added to his discussion that; “During seven months (July-Jan 2016-17) total exports of textile products declined by 1.54% over last year. According to his expert opinion the main reason for this decline is that the exports are facing a tough competition from the competitor countries in the region and the increasing production cost with persistent liquidity crunch. He added that the government had been successful in reducing the electricity and gas load shedding to a great extent which was now under control.
He also added that the production cost is also an important factor behind slowdown in exports which had led to lower production and closure of a number of export-oriented industries which had finally resulted in the drop of textile exports. While addressing the issue he demanded that; “Therefore the government should release all long pending refunds of exporters immediately to arrest the persistent decline in textile exports.”
