ISLAMABAD: The local manufacturing/assembling plants manufactured/assembled 6.1 million mobile handsets during the first two months (January-February) of the calendar year 2024 compared to 0.3 million imported commercially.
Official data revealed that local manufacturing/assembling plants manufactured/assembled 3.83 million mobile handsets during February compared to 0.06 million imported commercially.
Further, the locally manufactured/ assembled 6.1 million mobile phones handsets included 2.78 million 2G and 3.35 million smartphones. Besides, as per the PTA’s data, 60 percent of mobile devices are smartphones, and 40 percent are 2G on the Pakistan network.
Local manufacturing/assembling of mobile handsets declined by around four percent during the calendar year 2023, attributable to issues in imports on account of restricting the opening of Letters of Credit (LCs) for mobile phones’ accessories. However, despite restrictions, commercial imports of mobile handsets increased during this period, official data revealed.
Local manufacturing plants have manufactured/assembled 21.28 million mobile handsets during calendar year 2023 compared to 21.94 million during the same period of 2022 and 24.66 million in 2021. However, commercial imports increased from 1.53 million in 2022 to 1.58 million in 2023. Further, the locally manufactured/assembled 21.28 million mobile phones handsets included 13 million 2G and 8.28 million smartphones.
The country imported mobile phones worth $1.148 million during the first eight months (July-February) of the current fiscal year 2023-24, registering a growth of 156.43 percent when compared to $447.854 million during the same period of last fiscal year.
Pakistan’s mobile phone imports declined by 17.46 percent on a Month-on-Month (MoM) basis in February 2024 and stood at $160.899 million compared to imports of $194.928 million in January 2024, according to the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS).
Mobile phone imports registered 386.78 percent growth on a Year-on-Year (YoY) basis in February 2024 when compared to $33.054 million in February 2023.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024
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