FAISALABAD, April 26: The Pakistan Textile Exporters Association chairman has expressed grave concern over more than 11 per cent decline in exports of bedsheet from Faisalabad in the first three months of 2005 after textile quota phased out under the WTO regime.

Talking to newsmen here on Tuesday, PTEA chairman Faiq Jawed said the exports of bedlinen from the district for the first three and-a-half months last year were US$ 320 million while they had declined to $280 million in the corresponding period in 2005, recording a decrease of $40 million (11.7 per cent).

The major factor behind the decline in the bedlinen export was cumulative 25 per cent anti-dumping and GSP concession withdrawal (12 percent) tariff barrier imposed by the EU on bedlinen exports from Pakistan, he said.

“Pakistan is placed in a disadvantageous position for being the only country in the world facing a handicap of 25 per cent on its fast growing and dominant export item.

The European buyers were not prepared to pay 25 per cent higher prices for Pakistani bedlinen due to which the flow of export orders has decreased,” he added.

He apprehended that if the trend continued, the country’s textile industry would be badly hit and might result in closure of textile units, which have set up modern and state-of-the-art machinery at a huge cost over the last three years. Consequently, the industry would be constrained to lay off their labour resulting in unemployment and breach of industrial peace, he warned.

Mr Faiq pointed out that the very first year after the textile quota phased out and setting in of a new world trade order was very crucial for Pakistan’s textiles. Any displacement of these textiles from their traditional export markets and destination ports such as Europe would cause irreparable loss and it would be very difficult for exporters to regain the lost markets as was experienced when the industry was nationalized in the 1970s.

The Pakistan industry was burdened with both internal and external handicap factors, he said.

The PTEA chief demanded that Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz should look into the matter and provide adequate compensatory relief to textile exporters to sustain their competitiveness in the international market.