950830

54 pc drop in July '95

MoC, EPB blamed

for declining

leather exports

RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: Pakistan Leather Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Forum has blamed the Ministry of Commerce and Export Promotion Bureau for continuous decline in export of leather garments which registered a drop of 54 percent in the month of July 1995.

Export of leather during the month dropped to $15.26 million from $36.26 million during June 1995. It was also lower as compared with $25.47 million in July 1994.

A spokesman of the forum, Fawad Ijaz Khan, regretted that in spite of various meetings and representations made by the leather garments exporters, nothing has been done to arrest the declining trend in exports.

He said that the decline in export of leather garments continued for the last one year. The main reason for the decline is increase in the export of semi-finished and finished leather especially high quality leather which has led to the increase in prices of leather in the local market and created a shortage of good quality leather.

The gap created in the export market by decline in export of Pakistani goods has been filled by India, China and Indonesia. The Ministry of Commerce and EPB officials were repeatedly approached to take corrective measures but to no avail.

The Pakistan Leather Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Forum has proposed a 15 percent duty on the export of all kinds of semi-finished and finished leather. If the proposal is not acceptable to the government, it should urgently announce some incentives for the leather garment exporters to enable them to re-capture the export market, the forum leader suggested.

The incentives sought by the leather exporters include duty free import of accessories, income tax relief for 3 years, export re-finance at 3 percent mark up, and waiver of 0.25 percent export cess.

Fawad Ijaz urged the Central Board of Revenue to notify a single rate of duty drawback for the export of leather garments. Presently, there are two rates of duty drawback - 9.95 percent and 5.82 percent. He opted for the higher rate of duty drawback that is 9.95 percent. Further, the value of imported accessories be reduced from the FOB value while calculating the duty drawback amount, he concluded.