Loadshedding since 2008: Industrial sectors face a spike in gas cuts

ABDUL RASHEED AZAD

ISLAMABAD: The gas load-shedding for various sectors of the national economy since 2008 has increased manifold.

An analysis of the gas load-management plan of 2008-09 and the current plan reveals that in 2008-09 all the sectors of the economy faced up to 685 Million Cubic Feet per Gas (MMCFD) of gas curtailment, while in 2011-12 it crossed 1.5 Billion Cubic Feet (BCFD) mark. Textile industry in 2008-09 faced a 90-day gas curtailment, whereas it experienced outages lasting 180 days this year, which forced many industrialists to shift their business abroad. Millions working in private sector have been rendered jobless because of increased gas and power cuts.

According to Gohar Ijaz, the former chairman of All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA), as many as 1.5 million workers lost their livelihoods in just textile sector because of the energy crisis over the past four years.

Between December 2008 and February 2009, the authorities curtailed a total 125 MMCFD gas for the fertilizer industry, while this year the industry is not being provided with any gas even in May. There was no gas load-shedding for the CNG sector in 2008-09, which at present is facing three-day-long gas suspension. Similarly, textile and general industry faced load-shedding only in winter in 2008, while in 2012, they are also facing gas load-shedding lasting three days a week.

President Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) Irfan Qaiser Sheikh told Business Recorder that there should be a rational formula for energy distribution. "If there is any shortage, it should be distributed equally among all provinces."

Criticising the situation, which he termed an unfair competition, he said that Karachi, being the country's largest city faced no power or gas load-shedding. Lahore, he said, the country's second largest industrial city, faced power cuts lasting at least 12 hours a day while its industry had been deprived of gas for 80 out of the past 95 days.

Stressing the need for devising an equitable electricity distribution formula, Irfan Sheikh said that this was perhaps the only example in the world that the difference in cost of doing business was almost double in the second largest industrial city than the largest one.