Importers cry for help as shipments stuck at China port

KARACHI: Importers have called on the government to help release Pakistani import shipments stuck at Shanghai seaport as the Chinese industrial and trade hub is currently under a strict lockdown to contain the new Covid outbreak, The News learnt on Saturday.

Pakistan relies heavily on China for imports especially for raw materials for textile, chemicals as well as the consumer goods to meet the domestic needs.

The country’s imports from China make 27 percent of total imports. During the last financial year, the country imported $15.5 billion worth of goods from China out of the total import bill of the country, which totaled $56.37 billion in the last fiscal year.

According to the people in the trade and industry circles, the problem popped up in the month of March this year and intensified in April, when a strict lockdown was imposed to contain Covid in the industrial hub and port city of China.

Masood Naqi, industrialist and representative of Korangi Association of Trade & Industry (KATI) confirmed to The News that importers were facing huge problems due to stuck import consignments.

He said this situation was also not good for the country’s exports as the same containers would be used for it.

“This has been a serious problem for local industry for the last two months,” Naqi said and added that the supply chain of raw materials for local industry largely depended on imports from China, especially textile and chemical industries.

“Consumer goods like electronics, plastics etc are also imported from China.”

Naqi said around 2,000 containers used to come from China carrying imported goods and the same were used for export after delivery of imported cargoes.

"Now half of these containers are coming to Pakistan after staying stuck at Shanghai and two other ports of China."

The issue was taken up with the government when it had started emerging as a threat to trade, the KATI chief added.

“In March this year, former federal ministers Ali Zaidi and Abdul Razaq Dawood were urged to intervene and help resolve the issue; however, a change of regime put everything on hold and the new government will take time to step in.”

Rahman Panjwani, a freight forwarder, said the issue of stuck containers was worrying; however, it was hard to figure how many containers were stuck at Shanghai port.

"Some containers carrying imported cargo did arrive in Pakistan, but are trapped in clearance because their documents are yet not received," Panjwani said.