KARACHI: The Ministry of Industries and Production has notified the composition of Automotive Industry Development Committee (AIDC) in the Engineering Development Board under the new auto policy.

The committee has 24 members, including representatives of the auto sector, ministries of science, industries, commerce and communication, Planning Commission, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), Higher Education Commission, Pakistan Standard and Quality Control Authority, and the Consumers Rights Commission of Pakistan. The committee also has five co-opted members.

However, the committee has inducted a Chinese bike assembler — United Auto Industries — as its member instead of the chairman of bike assemblers’ body. Its managing director Sana Ullah Chaudhry will represent the assemblers of Chinese bikes and rickshaws.

United Auto Industries is also a member of the Pakistan Automotive Manufacturers Association (PAMA), which is considered as the representative body of Japanese auto assemblers. In the last few years, some Chinese two- and three-wheeler assemblers have become PAMA members.

Association of Pakistan Motorcycle Assemblers chairman Mohammad Sabir Shaikh said he had been the member of AIDC for almost a decade, but his name was not included in the new notification (dated Dec 19, 2016).

He said the government should announce an auto sector taxation committee under the FBR or the Ministry of Finance, because AIDC was useless for the whole auto sector and many taxation issues of the sector were still unresolved.

Published in Dawn, January 3rd, 2017