KARACHI: Pakistan's seafood export nosedived to historic low by about 55.03 percent during July 2021, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics shows. Exporters are left stunned with seafood export slump this July, blaming the government's red-tape for the historic fall.
The country's seafood export was 6,759 metric tons in July 2021 that was at the level of 15,031 metric tons down by about 55.03 percent, they were of the view. Whereas, in term of value in Pak rupees it plunged by 65.30 percent comparing to the fisheries export in July last fiscal year, exporters said. In July 2021, seafood export value was Rs2.253 million as compared to its export price of Rs6,509 million in July 2020, they added.
There was major decrease in the value in US dollar term. It has slumped by 47.79 percent comparing to the seafood export in the same month last fiscal year. In July 2021, seafood export value was $14.116 million as compared to its price of $27.039 million in July 2020, the said.
"This is alarming sign that new fiscal year 2021-2022 started with a bad omen and seafood export has dropped history lowest in a month," Faisal Iftikhar, former Chairman, Pakistan Fisheries Exporter Association, said.
"The export performance of the sector during the year 2020-2021 was not any better," he said and added that seafood export was 184.396 million tons fetching $414.193 million, which is much less than that of the highest fisheries export of 198.410 million tons with revenue of $451,026 million in 2017-2018.
"Major factors in this disparity are over fishing, decreased demand for some of our seafood products, bureaucratic snags and procedural difficulties in seafood export," he added.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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