In order to facilitate local cotton cultivators, the Special Committee of
National Assembly (NA) on Agricultural Products has decided to bring
forward a resolution to consider placing import duty of 10 to 15 per cent on
cotton.
NA Speaker Asad Qaiser, who chaired the meeting held in the Parliament
House on Wednesday, also instructed authorities to determine the
practicality of the suggested increase in import duty, which currently stands
at zero.
The meeting also expressed concern over the Rs2 increase in price of per unit
of electricity under the fuel price adjustment and summoned the energy
minister in the next meeting in this regard.
The secretary of the Trade Ministry informed the meeting that Pakistan is a
net importer of cotton, importing mainly from USA, India and Brazil. The
import of cotton the previous year amounted to $1 billion. The production of
cotton in India increased by 150% but did not increase in Pakistan due to
which cotton cannot be exported, he said.
Pakistan’s reliance on imported cotton on the rise
Minster for Food Security Sahibzada Mehboob Sultan informed the meeting
that steps were taken to provide relief to cultivators whose crops were
destroyed due to rain. He added that people would be compensated once
losses have been estimated.
During the meeting, Riaz Fatyana said that the duty on import of cotton has
been decreased from 5 per cent to zero, while calling for the levying of 10 to
15% duty on import of cotton. He said currently it was benefitting
businessmen.
Khalid Khokhar, a representative of a farmers’ collective, said that the
production cost in Pakistan was very high which skewed the situation in
favour of the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) while resulting
in losses for the farmers.“Pakistani cultivators stopped the plantation of cotton on not receiving
profits,” he said. He added that for the improvement of economy, the support
price of cotton is necessary.
The secretary for food security, Hashim Popalzai said that they had opposed
the decision made by the minister of textiles to impose zero duty on import
of cotton. “Cotton is imported due to zero duty on cotton,” he added.Cotton Commissioner Dr Khalid Abdullah said that the production area of
cotton has declined from 770,000 hectare to 400,000 hectare. “This year
there was a difference of Rs1,500 per ton of cotton. The rates of cotton
remained around the cost of production,” he said.
Speaker Asad Qaiser said that to promote local cotton, a resolution would be
brought to the NA in relation to imposition of duty. He directed committee
member Syed Fakhar Imam to prepare the draft and discuss it with him for
presentation in the NA today (Thursday).
On this occasion, Chaudhry Iftikhar Nazir said that the electricity has been
hiked by Rs2 for agricultural consumers.
“The electricity has been increased by Rs2 under the fuel price adjustment
but the rate for agricultural consumers is Rs5.35 paisa per unit. Now the
pressure of fuel price adjustment has been put on the cultivators,” he said,
upon which the committee summoned the federal minister energy in the next
session.
The committee also summoned the Aptma representatives in the next
meeting on the issue of cotton.
Source: The Tribune, India Friday, 26 April 2019