ISLAMABAD, July 17: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Tuesday said government was taking a number of steps to help textile industry improve its position in the global trade and to avail opportunities of the quota free environment.

He was talking to a delegation of Pakistan Bedwear Exporters’ Association headed by its Chairman Shabbir Ahmed who called on prime minister to discuss various proposals for increasing exports of the sector.

An official announcement issued here said that textile sector had shown substantial development during the last few years.

Mr Aziz said the growth is largely driven by the continuity of government policies, positive macroeconomic indicators, tariff rationalisation, removal of sales tax on textile chain, deregulation, lower interest rates, increased market access, public-private partnership programmes and the creation of a hassle free environment by the government.

He said government would continue to take steps to further develop the textile sector focusing on bridging the skills gap, promoting research and development activities, facilitating women employees, outsourcing of specialised work and simplification of procedures.

He emphasized the need to retool and reform the industry in keeping with the best management practices. He said the government is also making focused efforts to improve the infrastructure and the logistics chain in order to lower the cost of production.

The members of the delegation appreciated the efforts made by the government to facilitate the private sector and said the level-playing field provided to our industry vis-‘-vis competing countries, improved transport and communications infrastructure and network, skills development and governments focus on capacity building of the existing and the future human resources has brought improvement in the textiles and bedwear sectors.