Nepali delegation visits Turkey to end yarn export hassles
A
delegation from Nepal led by a senior official from the ministry of
industry, commerce and supplies recently visited Turkey and provided
supporting documents to Ankara to help wrap up the ongoing investigation
into the former’s yarn export and resume its trade. The delegation comprised experts and representatives from the Nepal Yarn Producers’ Association.
Alleging
that Nepal was exporting Chinese yarn, Turkey had suspended the
generalised system of preferences (GSP) benefit on export of yarn from
Nepal in January this year. It had cited a considerable growth in export
from Nepal — around 190 per cent between 2011 and 2017 — without a
reliable domestic production base as the reason for suspending the
facility.
Data
related to production units, production capacity of the spinning mills,
employment generated by these factories and taxes filed by them were
presented by Nepal to the directorate general of customs enforcement in
Turkey, according to a Nepali newspaper report.
Nepal clarified that the factories were mostly running below capacity earlier as the country
was facing crippling power shortage and labour unrest. As the demand
for yarn rose, Nepali factories started increasing their production
capacity and some of them have now doubled their capacity utilisation
from 35-40 per cent earlier to 70-75 per cent.
India
and Turkey are the major export destinations for Nepali yarn. Out of
Nepal’s total annual yarn export worth around Rs 15 billion, yarn worth
Rs 5 billion is exported to Turkey, according to yarn exporters.
There was no chance
of circumvention as Nepali factories are still operating below full
capacity, the Turkish Government authorities were told.
The Nepali delegation also
invited the Turkish investigation team to visit the production units in
their country to verify their data.
The
Nepali team met Turkish importers of Nepali yarn in Istanbul and
briefed them about its talks with the government officials. (DS)
Source: The Himalayan Times, Nepal Tuesday, 17 April 2018