Dying jute industry

One sub-sector in our textile industry that goes highly unnoticed is jute. We rarely hear about jute in the news jute mills are relatively quiet over their issues and their falling exports; theres only one jute association (PJMA) comprised of 10 members; there are only three listed jute companies in all of Pakistan; and presently, only five jute mills are operational. So its interesting that the SBPs quarterly State of the Economy report chose to concentrate on jute in the textile category.

As per the report, The performance of the textile sector remained sluggish mainly due to a 52 percent fall in the manufacturing of jute goods during Jul-Sep FY17 (on YoY basis). The report goes on to highlight some issues about the jute industry, most of which this column has covered before (Read: The jute conundrum, published on May 22, 2015).

There has been a shift from jute to synthetic packaging, like polypropylene. Since jute is by and large used in making sacks the dominant buyers of which are the federal and provincial governments the shift towards synthetic sacks has devastated the jute industry. Moreover, Pakistan does not grow jute indigenously and imports it from Bangladesh (99 percent of input comprises of imported raw material), who put a ban on their jute exports in November 2015. Finally, the usual lack of research and development and technology upgradation is there as well.

Supporting the data on jute production, the graph illustrates that Pakistans jute imports have plummeted while the exports have completely flat-lined. This industry appears to be going extinct fast, and its rescue is nowhere in sight. Again, its interesting that the jute industry is being highlighted in the SBPs report as the reason behind a sluggish textile sector, since it has never been in the limelight and its eminence in the textile industry is and has been negligible.