Pakistan Textile Exporters Association (PTEA) has demanded immediate restoration of gas supply to textile industries in order to save this precious foreign exchange earning sector from collapse.
Expressing resentment over the gas suspension to textile industry in Punjab on Monday, PTEA Chairman Sohail Pasha and Vice Chairman Rizwan Riaz Saigal termed it unilateral and arrogant.
They appealed that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif should intervene and restore gas supply to precious forex earning sector as this would lead to missing export orders, capital flight, labour lay-off, worsening of law and order and decline in government’s revenue.
Sohail and Rizwan said that sudden cut in gas supply would push the textile industry to the wall that was already facing huge problems owing to high input cost and other issues.
Unilateral policies and decisions without taking stakeholders into the loop should be stopped as the country, at present, is going through a very serious economic crisis in terms of escalating cost of production, they added.
The PTEA chairman expressed that textile industry is already running below the capacity due to energy constraints, ultimately affecting industry’s potential to grow fast and earn foreign exchange for the country. He said that suspension of gas supply would hamper production of textiles and halt the industrial activities. It would not only hamper the industrial growth, but also put jobs of millions of workers at stake.