PM’s notice of car price hike hailed

LAHORE: The Pakistan Association of Automotive Parts and Accessories Manufacturers (PAAPAM) has appreciated the prime minister for taking notice of higher automobile prices in the country, which is mainly due to lower content of localised parts, a statement said on Saturday.

PAAPAM’s senior members in a meeting said that the government’s strict tariff and taxation policy are affecting the car prices in the country and need to be reviewed, it added.

The imposition of the regulatory duty, additional Customs duty, devaluation of the rupee, and higher federal excise duty are major burdens on the car consumers, they added.

“As the existing auto policy is to expire by the midyear, right away triggering preparations for AIDP 2021/26, it is a right time to give complete shakeup to the stagnant system regulating the automotive regime, and to bring transparency and credibility to the procedures,” they said.

“PAAPAM fears that in the absence of a transparent import regulatory system for automotive parts, the economic situation will have a further dip with the new entrants, coming in the field and launch of electric vehicles being on the doorstep.”

“It’s the time to deeply analyse the root cause of high prices of cars in the country and devise a long-term strategy to timely produce the vehicles in line with the demand, besides devising and implementing 10-year “Auto parts localisation policy” to ensure the localisation of all value-added parts.”

It would result in cost reduction, reduction in lead time parts availability to assemblers, and vehicle availability to consumers,; they said.

Moreover, these measures will create technology awareness, generating skilled jobs for the local youth, reducing revenue loss to the government exchequers, besides forcing the OEMs to invest in inspection and testing labs and to reduce lead time for the approval of the locally-developed auto parts.