Economy in bad shape, no option of subsidies: Razak

FAISALABAD: Adviser to Prime Minister on Commerce, Textile, Industry and Production and Investment Abdul Razak Dawood has said that the economy is in a bad shape due to ill-planning and ill-conceived policies of past government, therefore there is no option of subsidies.

However, he said, the government is trying to put the economy on right track through prudent policies and difficult decisions.

Talking to journalists after inaugurating Female Exclusive Training Institute at Faisalabad Garment City, Razak said that only through improved efficiency and productivity, sustainable development can be ensured on long-term basis.

The PM adviser said Pakistani exporters must enhance their efficiency and productivity to compete in the international market instead of depending on subsidies and other artificial supports.

Addressing the fifth international conference on ‘Value addition and innovation in textile and NTU-DICE textile innovation event’ organised by the National Textile University Faisalabad, the PM adviser said the government has finalised policy interventions for upgradation and value addition in textile sector with enhanced market access.

Razak said that now it was the time for business community to exploit and contribute its role in capturing the global textile market.

He said that no doubt textile was the main economic strength of Pakistan but the entire textile chain had inherent problems of technology upgradation. He said that starting from ginning up to textile garments the entire chain was working with obsolete technology. He said that the government had introduced new reforms through policy interventions. “We were working on a progressive industrial policy, which would be compatible with the emerging challenges and it would be based on diversification, expansion and deepening from top to bottom so that it could provide sustainable results”, he added.

He underlined the importance of the SMEs sector and said that a separate policy would be framed to encourage and promote this segment. Regarding tariff policy and duty structure, the advisor said that the government had made progress on it while more steps would be taken in the coming budget.

Abdul Razak Dawood mentioned the issues of cost of doing business and ease of doing business and said that our ranking had improved from 147 to 136 as regards ease of doing business while we were trying to further improve it in addition to bring Pakistan at the ranking of 100th country. He said that some tariffs had already been trimmed by the government while as policy measures we had decided to further reduce the tariff especially on the import of raw material.