The business community of Southern Punjab has criticised the proposed increase in power tariff by Rs 2.53 to 3.00 to collect Rs 120 billion describing it detrimental to the already hard pressed industry.
President of Multan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) Mian Iqbal Hassan said that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif should immediately order the Ministry of Water and Power to reduce electricity tariff, especially for industrial and agriculture sectors to give a kick-start to the dampened industrial activities and help private sector to create new job opportunities in addition to enhancing national exports.
Mian Iqbal Hassan further said that no doubt the government needs revenue to run the state but revenue generation should be affordable and taxes should not be as high to undermine the GDP growth.
He said that the cheap electricity is the lifeline of industrial growth and the government should come out of the old approach to generate electricity with costly resources. He said that if transmission and distribution losses are also added, the electricity will cost hardly stand around Rs 6 per unit. He said that contrary to the actual price, the industries are paying approximately Rs 14.60 per unit for electricity. He said that this difference is adding to the cost of production and now the major industries have either gone sick or forced to operate at 30-40 percent of their installed capacity.
Comments
Comments are closed.