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     10-year tax holiday for Gwadar Port, export zone

A large quantity of urea was imported through Gwadar port in the winter of 2008/9.—APP/File

ISLAMABAD:  Federal Minister for Industry & Production Manzoor Ahmed Wattoo has said that a ten year tax holiday has been granted to Gwadar Port Authority and the export processing zone (EPZ) established there.

Addressing a press conference here on Wednesday, the minister said only fifty per cent of the products manufactured at the Gwadar EPZ and the industrial areas of Gwadar port authority could be exported.‘They will have to sell the remaining fifty per cent products to the local consumers,’ Mr Wattoo said. The export processing zone at Gwader would have all the facilities which are available to other EPZs in the country he added.

Mr Wattoo said that the plots for investors would be given in consultation with the government of Balochistan.He said that Gwadar is the port of the future and a gateway to trade with Central Asia.He even gave credit for establishing the Gwadar port project to the present government. He also declined to respond to the queries by media that the said project was initiated under former regime of president Gen (Retd) Pervez Musharraf.

The minister for industries also said that but one bag of urea weighing 50 kilograms would be available at Rs710 during the Kharif season.To the question of ongoing urea black marketing by more than Rs200 per bag the minister said that all such issues would be taken care of after his recent meeting with fertilizer companies.

But he declined to give the details of action plan to curb black marketing by the dealers.

However, the minister requested the farmers not to create panic while purchasing urea as it encourages black marketing.He said that the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) after formal approvals would import 654,000 tones urea by July when during the peak of Kharif season.‘The government would be giving Rs6.5 billion subsidy in urea as the the price differential of imported urea and its sale price would be Rs500 per bag,’ he said.

Similarly the urea manufacturers are getting Rs282 per bag which amounts Rs14 billion subsidies thus totalling a subsidy during the Kharif to Rs20.5 billion, he added.With total urea requirement of three million tones during Kharif, the local urea production stands at 2.55 million tones with gap of 0.4 million tones and it would be bridged with the imported one, the minister said.The minister also briefed that the ECC, which met the other day has also approved another import of 200,000 tones urea for Kharif.

‘Around 164,000 tones have so far reached the country, while Letters of Credits of 255,000 tones will be opened within next few of days.’ he said adding that total fertilizer off-take during Kharif was estimated at 2.9 million tones with Punjab at 2.03 million tones, Sindh 580,000 tones, NWFP 180,000 tones, Balochistan 68,000 tones and buffer stock in country stands at 48,000 tones.Dawn.Thursday May 21,2009