KARACHI: Chinese footwear for gents and children, which ruled the market few years back, are facing stiff competition from locally manufactured shoes which are capitalising on the poor quality of the imported stuff.

Traders and manufacturers say that buyers have started realising that it’s waste of money to buy Chinese footwear even though it still costs less than locally-made shoes.

“Our market share was earlier sliding due to heavy influx of cheap Chinese footwear,” Chairman Pakistan Footwear Manufacturers Association (PFMA), Nasir Anwar Shaikh told Dawn from Lahore.

“We now hold 60-70pc market share in children’s footwear while imported shoes especially Chinese enjoy 30pc share,” he said.

“We have captured 90pc of the gents’ shoes market leaving just 10pc for foreign brands,” he claimed, adding that ladies segment share is also satisfactory.

He said the footwear market is estimated at Rs150 billion per annum keeping in view the country’s 180 million population which needs at least two pair of shoes per person.

Local manufacturers are also doing well on export front as total footwear exports increased to $119m in 2013-14 from $104m in 2012-13.

The share of leather footwear in total exports was $96m as compared to $83.5m.

A market survey shows that a good quality leather shoe price starts from Rs2,400.

In contrast, low quality Chinese leather shoes can be purchased at Rs1,200-1,500.—ASK

Published in Dawn, July 27th, 2014