KARACHI, July 3: Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) has given counter offer to the highest bidder of raw cotton, asking him to enhance the bid price by Rs100 per maund against the quoted price of Rs2,071 per maund.

The price evaluation committee of TCP in its meeting held on Wednesday had decided to conditionally accept the highest bid offer at Rs2,071 for grade-III staple length 1-1/16”. The committee has asked the highest bidder to improve its offer by Rs100 per maund.

However, TCP has not accepted the highest bid made at Rs1,926 per maund for grade-III staple length 1-1/32” as the corporation has decided not to sell this quality below Rs2,000 per maund, the TCP sources told Dawn.

The corporation, through tender notice in the last week of June, had invited bids for 50,000 bales of raw cotton from 2001-2002 crop for local sale and fixed July 2, 2002 as tender opening date.

In total the TCP received 31 bids for 1-1/16” for which minimum bid offer was fixed at Rs1,905 per maund and 25,000 bales were offered for sale. Similarly, the minimum bid price was fixed at Rs1,855 per maund for grade-III 1-1/32” cotton and 25,000 bales were offered but only six bids were received.

The TCP sources said the highest bidder for grade-III staple length 1-1/16” had been given chance to accept or reject the counter offer by Thursday afternoon or else the offer would be treated as cancelled.

Meanwhile, presently the New York cotton market rates are being quoted at around 45 cents per pound.

On the other hand, All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) urged the government to dispose of TCP’s entire stocks of raw cotton in the local market as there was a strong demand from the textile industry.

In a statement here, Aptma chairman Nadeem Maqbool said that textile industry’s cotton consumption had risen owing to increase in capacity of spindles over the past two years.

He said presently the industry needed more than 10.3 million bales, therefore, the TCP should not be allowed to sell the cotton to foreign buyers at low prices, particularly when the local industry was willing to pay better price.

Referring to the July 2 tender, the Aptma chief said that level of participation had clearly indicated that the industry needed cotton. Similarly, he said that prices offered also indicated that the industry was paying a better price than the foreign buyers.

The Aptma chairman said that local mills had offered a price of Rs1,950 for grade III, which was almost equal to the price offered by foreign buyers for grade I clean cotton in the last export tender. He said that Aptma had always advocated that the cotton purchased by TCP should be offered to the highest bidder.

The Aptma chairman, however, criticized the stand of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) in opposing the sale of cotton by TCP to the local mills.

He said that unsold cotton stocks with ginners had come down substantially, adding that these stocks were of very low quality and would be purchased by lower quality manufacturers and open-end mills till end of the season.