LAHORE, Dec 8: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz’s decision to form yet another committee to examine the report prepared by the National Textile Strategy Committee (NTSC) has “disappointed and frustrated” most textile producers and exporters, who were expecting an immediate action on the recommendations made by the committee to bail out the textile industry from its current crisis.

However, Aptma chairman Shafqat Elahi, who is a member of the NTSC led by prominent businessman Tariq Saigol, is quite upbeat about the outcome of the meeting of the NTSC with the prime minister in Islamabad on Thursday where Mr Aziz was given a briefing on the committee’s report and its proposals for bailing out the industry.

“Such complex issues cannot be solved in just one meeting. The prime minister listened

to what we had to say, questioned, and looked quite positive about the report and its recommendations,” he told Dawn on Friday.

He refused to divulge the details of the meeting and the report, saying the thrust of the NTSC was on reducing the cost of doing business for the entire chain of textiles.

In answer to a question, he said the prime minister had not put a timeframe from the bailout package expected by the industry on the basis of the National Textile Strategy Committee recommendations.

However, many other businessmen related to textile trade do not share Mr Elahi’s optimism. “I’m frustrated. The government seems more interested in forming committees rather than resolving the problems facing the industry,” says yarn exporter Adil Mahmood.

“First we had the Zubair Motiwala committee, then the National Textile Strategy Committee was formed, and now we have yet another committee. This is not how the problems related to the industry and international trade are addressed.

Time is of essence; if we lose our buyers and markets now, it would be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible to recapture them,” he stressed.

Mr Mahmood said the widening trade and current account deficit should be an eye opener for the rulers, who should not waste any more time in bailing out the industry.

Pakistan Readymade Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association Ijaz Khokhar was also disappointed at the “delay in the announcement of a bailout package for the value-added sector.

“It is strange that the NTSC did not have any representative of the apparel industry. We don’t know what the Tariq Saigol committee has proposed for the apparel sector, if it has at all,” he said while talking to this reporter from Sialkot.

He appreciated the prime minister’s concern over the situation, but added that the industry needed a quick decision. He said the country’s exports were plummeting because of higher cost of doing business. “The markets once lost are difficult to be recaptured,” he said, adding the prime minister must take out some time from his schedule to listen to the representatives of the value-added apparel sector.