Steel merchants of Sarya galli, the main market of steel bars, billets, angles, scraps and sheets, have demanded complete abolition of duty on import of re-rollable scrap.
Commenting on the recent decision of the cabinet to reduce import duty on re-rollable scrap to 10 percent, they observed that though the decision would bring down the prices of steel products to some extent, however, there was a need to further reduce the duty to overcome the aggravating steel crisis in the country.
In this respect, a group of iron and steel merchants also held a meeting with the Union of Small and Medium Enterprises (Unisame) to thoroughly discuss the crisis and adopt remedial measures.
Unisame convener, Zulfikar Thaver supporting the concerns of the merchants said that until and unless the world prices of scrap, billets and pig iron was reduced, the SMEs would not be in a position to overcome the situation and the import duty was needed to be completely abolished only then the situation would be manageable.
The team of iron merchants, headed by a leading steel trader Kashif Ayub observed that the situation was extremely worse for the whole steel industry including automobile and other related industries due to the increase in prices of cold rolled, hot rolled and GI sheets.
Kashif Ayub pointed out that the international prices of scrap had increased from $ 150 PMT to $ 300 - 350 and of billets from $ 200 to 400, which is an exorbitant increase.
He further explained that Belgium, France, Germany and Japan, the main shippers, were compelled by the international market and even Pakistan Steel Mills had to increase prices by 30 percent on almost all of its products.
"The construction and engineering industries are also on the verge of closure as they will not be able to honour their commitments and will back out resulting in reversal of the industrial growth.
The present government had been giving priority to the housing and construction industry but it seems that this increase in steel prices will make all priorities null and void. The government has reduced duty but the duty should be removed completely", he added.
He suggested that custom duty should be slashed on all steel products including hot rolled coil, cold rolled coil, galvanised steel etc, as these items constituted the essential part of many sectors of the economy.
Zulfikar Thaver reiterated that iron/steel was the raw material of many industries right from small workshops to huge factories and was used in the manufacture of many items ranging from nut bolts, to heavy equipment and machinery and if no further relief was provided, all the inter-dependent items would be badly shaken.
He appealed to the government to remove all duties, taxes and burdens from iron and steel to save the industries from collapse.