HYDERABAD: Representatives of Sindh’s leading chambers of commerce and industry have slammed the government for its failure to tackle economic crisis and observed that Pakistan urgently needed charter of economy and asked the government to sit with business leaders and find out a solution to extricate the country out of this crisis.

They said that worsening economic conditions had forced members of business community to think about leaving the country which was on the verge of default.

They were speaking at a joint press conference at Jamshoro Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) the other day. “We need the charter of economy for a period of five to 10 years for sustainable economic policies,” said JCCI president Yasir Malik.

“Containers of raw materials remain stuck up at ports but we are not allowed to open letters of credit (LCs) to get them released. Is our money meant for wastage,” he said bitterly.

He said that Pakistan needed political and economic stability and warned if the government did not pay heed to their concerns they would boycott next general election and hold protests.

Hyderabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Adeel Siddiqui pleaded for wise economic policies to enable industrialists to play their role in the progress of the country. “There has to be a balance between imports and exports” he said.

He said that governor of the State Bank of Pakistan promised allowing traders to open LCs at a programme but he failed to keep his word. “Had we been focussing on renewable energy we would not have been confronting this situation today,” he asserted.

He said the acceptance of IMF’s conditionalities meant subsidies would be withdrawn on electricity and gas by 74pc and 7pc while mark-up had already been raised by 1pc.

He feared that daal would be sold for Rs1,000 per kg in Ramazan because its import was not allowed and containers were not being cleared at the port which had caused the commodity’s shortage in market.

He believed after new IMF package inflation would touch 40pc mark from 24.5pc in December last year. “Increase in mark-up is not understandable,” he said.

Dadu Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Pardeep Kumar pointed out that the government should promote canola production in the province to reduce reliance on import of edible oil which was bought at a huge cost after crude oil. The combined import bill of the two items ran into billions of dollars, he said.

“We need to shift from fuel based energy production immediately and opt for solar and wind resource,” he said, adding this government was working without any planning.

Gurdas Wadvani, senior vice president Sukkur Chamber of Commerce and Industry, praised dollar’s depreciation and said if the step had been taken earlier it would have been better.

Shaheed Benazirabad Chamber of Commerce president Azeem Mughal called for ban on all new housing schemes for five years. “It will help shift investment to other businesses,” he said.

Published in Dawn, January 28th, 2023