PYMA asks Tarin not to impose RD on polyester yarn

KARACHI: Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (PYMA) on Wednesday expressed concerns regarding lobbying by local manufacturers of polyester filament yarns for urging the government to impose regulatory duty on imported polyester yarns.

PYMA Central Chairman Saqib Naseem urged Adviser to Prime Minister on Finance, Shaukat Tarin not to succumb to the pressure of local manufacturers, and to reject any proposal for imposition of regulatory duty on imports of polyester filament yarns, especially HS Code 5402.3300 and HS Code 5402.4700.

In a letter to Tarin, PYMA chairman said that the local manufacturers of polyester filament yarns were lobbying the concerned agencies, especially the Ministry of Commerce, to impose regulatory duty on imported polyester yarns. “This would be extremely detrimental to the local consumers of polyester filament yarn, and would be against the government’s policy of ensuring the availability of raw materials to the industry and consumers at competitive prices,” he said. Despite the fact that local manufacturers of polyester filament yarns were already enjoying discounted tariffs, efforts to implement regulatory duties would significantly increase the production cost of local industries, he added.

“The current custom duty of 11 percent is rather excessive. For your information the custom duty on polyester staple fibre is 7 percent and the local manufacturers of PSF seem to be doing with this level of protection. There is no significant production cost difference between polyester staple fibre and polyester filament yarn,” the chairman said. He added that the weaving and knitting industry (user industry) was already facing a very challenging situation due to very high cotton and polyester yarn prices, and imposition of regulatory duty would be extremely counterproductive, especially when the local user industry has to import 65 percent of its requirements of polyester filament yarn from foreign suppliers.

Naseem urged the government to take measures to reduce the cost of production of domestic industries, and stabilise the economy.