The Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers and Exporters Association (PHMA) has appreciated the exercise of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to simplify the export promotion schemes by developing a single unified scheme, suggesting few changes in the draft to make the process easier and simple.
In a letter to the Federal Board of Revenue, the PHMA zonal chairman Faisal Mehboob Sheikh said that the proposed single unified export promotion scheme needs to be simplified, as the rules of earlier export facilitation schemes, including Duty & Tax Remission for Exporters (DTRE), Export Oriented Units (EOU), Manufacturing Bond, Temporary Importation & Duty Drawback for textile exporters, were quite complicated and had cumbersome procedures and take months to import raw materials and intermediate goods.
He stated that exporters are facing great difficulties and their cost of doing business is higher compared to regional countries making them uncompetitive in the global market.
Faisal Mehboob Sheikh said that the exporters having a neat and clean history of ten years must be enrolled in these schemes automatically, sparing them from long and cumbersome procedure of assessment and enrollment.
“The temporary imports should be totally online under WEBOC portal. When the exporters import any material under said systems it should be entered online in the WEBOC of the exporter and when they export, the custom department should deduct their entry accordingly from their record,” PHMA (NZ) Chairman demanded.
He pointed out that the Input-Output Co-efficient Organization (IOCO) has not sufficient man-force to process the applications within 30 days even as the economy is gearing up around the world. This process should not take more than 2 weeks. So, IOCO should be faster to determine the input-output ratio and assessments of the production capacity of the applicants.
Moreover, the IOCO ratios, already settled, be incorporated automatically and exporters should not be bothered to go through the same processes again and again, he added.
About the utilization period of the input, Faisal Mahboob said that the consumption period of input goods, which is 72 months, is appreciated but no adverse inference shall be drawn against exporters due to lower production or exports of one or two years as given in rule 20(1) and (2). Instead exporter performance should be assessed after 72 months only.
Faisal Mehboob suggested that once the application for the temporary imports under DTRE is approved by the collectorate and 100% material is used in export in same measurement unit, the Auditors should audit the collectorate not the exporter, as the exporter has already got the approval accordingly and if there is any mistake by collectorate during approval process, the collectorate should be held responsible for it.
Chairman PHMA demanded that equal to 5% of the export performance of the SMEs should be allowed to import the accessories of the garments to be exported other than fabric including labels, hooks, tags, zippers, buttons, parts and all other related accessories under invoice value upto USD 500 or weight of parcel not more than 10Kg, free from any custom/sales duties,
Faisal Mehboob said it is time to facilitate the business community during these difficult times so they can secure the orders and compete in the international market.
“We are confident that our proposal would surely be taken up and considered most seriously and included in the upcoming exercise in the larger interests of our exports,” he added.
