MULTAN City News

PCGA rejects imposition of Rs 5 per bale cotton cess
From Our Correspondent
MULTAN: The Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association rejected the imposition of cotton cess at the rate of Rs 5 per bale describing it unjust and said the government departments had failed to show performance regarding cotton standardisation programme.
Talking to journalists here on Saturday, PCGA chairman Shahzad Ali Khan and Ginners group chairman Haji Muhammad Akram said that they would not pay cotton cess because central executive of the PCGA had already rejected the cess. They said that performance of research institutes and agricultural scientists was very poor and they had failed to evolve hi-yield, well-germinated and virus resistant varieties, which reduced the per acre yield to less than neighbouring countries and farmers were facing severe economic stress. The PCGA representatives said that ginners’ community was paying other taxes regularly and it would continue to adhere to its responsibilities. They said that the PCGA would play its role in meeting the crises of electricity, industrial and economic and it want to serve to make Pakistan an economically strong and prosperous country. They said that agriculture contributes 80pc in the country’s economy, adding that it provides raw material for textile, sugar industry, rice, maize, gram and many other things.
Meanwhile, a delegation of Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FPCCI) left for Egypt under the leadership of Haji Muhammad Akram. During the stay, the delegation would meet cotton growers, ginners, textile industrialists and traders.
CALL TO STRENGTHEN SMES: The Multan Chamber of Commerce and & Industry has stressed upon strengthening the Small and Medium Enterprises and availing Export Refinance Scheme of State Bank of Pakistan.
Addressing a seminar on ‘Export Finance Scheme and Long Term Financing Facilities for SMEs’ jointly organised by the MCCI and the SMEDA, MCCI vice-president Muhammad Tariq said that the SMEs should avail Export Finance Scheme (EFS) of the SBP to fulfil their financing needs and ultimately contribute to exports growth of the country. He said that banks could charge spread of 2pc (currently 1pc) under the scheme against lending to SMEs without changing prevailing end user rate. He said that for SMEs the incentives of mark-up rebate had been increased by 0.5 per cent for each category of existing export performance level. SBP Karachi Joint Director Muhammad Iqbal Khan Bangash said that the State Bank had decided that utilisation of available limits for SMEs by banks would also be taken into account while sanctioning their annual revolving limits under the EFS. Abdul Ghani, Muhammad Ashfaq, Muhammad Abdullah Khan, Aleena Durrani and others also spoke.