LAHORE, July 25: The All Pakistan Textile Mills Association, Punjab zone, has urged the government to extend the research and development and drawback facility given to downstream industry to the yarn manufacturers as well.

Members of the zonal managing committee, in a meeting of the APTMA held here on Friday, called upon the association chairman to take up the spinning industry issue with Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani.

They said the yarn manufacturing industry in Punjab and the NWFP was facing the location disadvantage of being away from the seaport and harsh weather like other downstream industries.

It requires to be given R&D and drawback facility available to the downstream industry because it is facing the same cost increases as other sectors of the textile industry.

The meeting recalled that in last year’s budget, three per cent R&D allowance had been announced for polyester staple fiber which was supposed to be passed on to the spinning industry.

The committee said the textile industry prepared the SRO for the allowance, but the finance ministry blocked it even though the measure was announced and provided for in the Finance Act. It also demanded that the export refinance, long term finance facility and investment credit facilities should also be made available to yarn manufacturers. The gas increase of 31 per cent announced by the OGRA should be recalculated and discrimination between various sectors of economy should be removed.

Committee members said the industry had invested $2.5 billion in gas generation power plants which formed an integral part of textile manufacturing.

They said this investment was forced to lie idle during winter gas shortage in Punjab and the NWFP. Members demanded that being an export industry, textile captive power plants should be given highest priority and should not be shut down during winters.

The industry could achieve 30 per cent growth in exports if the government provided necessary facilities to it, they said.