It is important to note that the Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) has asked the government to provide relief package for the ginning industry in order to promote cotton, save employment of million of workers and improving living standard of cotton farmers.
Muhammad Javed Suhail Rehmani, Senior Vice Chairman, Hareesh Kumar, Senior Vice Chairman, Hafiz Abdul Lateef , Vice Chairman and other representatives stated that the ginning industry was not provided much needed relief package in the budget.
They alleged that burden of taxes had decrease the cotton cultivation and pandemic COVID-19 also inflicted huge loss to ginners, textile sector and also to farming community. The cotton factories could not sell their stock due to pandemic of coronavirus circumstances.
Similarly, they could not make recoveries from textile sector due to COVID-19 situation. The PCGA representative demanded of the government to ensure sale of unsold stock to Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) so that they would achieve money to operationalize cotton factories for the ongoing season. There were over 1300 cotton factories and millions of farmers were directly associated with cultivation and harvesting of cotton crop and sale of lint, in case these factories were shut down then the workers would lose their jobs, they added.
PCGA members appealed the government to take immediate notice of ginning sector and offer much needed relief package. The relief could be given release of funds pending for last 10 years, electricity bills and abolishing sales tax on cotton lint.
