Despite 80 percent loss of cotton cropin Sindh because of the recent torrential rains, 12.5 billion cotton bales are expected this year, with ten billion bales from Punjab and 2.5 billion bales from Sindh.

This stock would be sufficient to meet the demand of textileindustry of the country till next cotton crop yield comes, saidFederal Minister for Textile Makhdoom Shahabuddin here on Friday.

“Thanks God, Punjab has a bumper cotton crop this year tocompensate the cotton loss in Sindh," the Minister remarked whilespeaking at a meeting with the Chairmen, Value Adding TextileAssociations, at Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers and ExportersAssociation (PHMA) House.

Secretary Textile Ministry Said Rushed seconded the Minister'sremarks and informed the meeting that in Punjab, this year cotton crop is very much safe from all kind of virus which over a last couple of years used to damage the crop very badly.

He said that before the rains-flood, 15 billion bales of cottonwere expected from Singh and Punjab.

"We would have a good stock of cotton", he said, however up to 1.5 billion cotton bales might needed to be imported to strengthen the availability position of this basic raw material for our textileindustry.

The Textile Minister assured the textile industrialists andexporters that he along with his team of the Ministry would make the best efforts to resolve or get resolved the problems facingtextile industry especially the release of refund amount to value-adding textile sector on account of Drawback of Local Taxes andLevies.

He said that he would also take up the issue of Export Development Fund amount, meant to be used for uplift of textile industry, with the concerned Government authorities including Prime Minister Yourself Raze Gianni.

The textile exporters have been contributing to EDF at the rate of 0.25 percent of their exports.

This fund is supposed to be spent on lobbying for free market access for Pakistani goods to new potential international markets.

He said that he would try to find time with the Prime Ministerfor a detailed working session and seek his kind support in gettingresolved their problems especially the release of refunds of theirclaims.

Besides a group of representatives from value-adding textilesector, he would request the Federal Finance Minister and the FinanceSecretary to attend the meeting to make it meaningful.

“I will call you on next Tuesday (Oct.11) and communicate theschedule of meeting with the Prime Minister," he said with assurancethat he would extend all out support to textile industry forresolution of its problems.

The Textile Secretary informed the textile leaders that Rest 7.5billion had been allocated for refund of Local Taxes and Levies over this financial year.

We had demanded the release of Rupees three billion for the first two quarters of 2011-12. But, he said, only Rest one billion have been released from the Ministry of Finance. However, he hadbeen pursuing the Secretary Finance to release Rest 3 billion.

“Hopefully, we will get Rest 3 billion," he assured adding that a meeting in this regard is scheduled on 12th of this month.

He said that in last two fiscal years, Rest 17.25 billion weredisbursed on this account.

When Chief Coordinator Council of Textile Associations and ChairmanPakistan Apparel Forum Muhammad Jawed Biplane demanded especial tariffsfor the value-adding textile sector like for the fertilizers sector,the Textile Minister assured that he had already talked to Federal Minister for Water and Power on rationalization of tariffs of gas, electricity and water to textile industry.