Winter season: Four days a week gas supply for textile mills

Hussain says the industry’s gas share will not be curtailed.

LAHORE:

Petroleum Minister Dr Asim Hussain has assured the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) that the government will supply gas for four days a week in winter and will scale it up to five days once gas starts flowing from new discoveries over the next three months.

The minister was trying to soothe the textile industry which had expressed fears, in recent advertisements in the media, of colossal losses due to expected disruption in gas supply.

The government’s load management plan, envisaging suspension of gas supply from Sui Northern Gas Pipelines during winter, has panicked the textile industry. According to the industry, it has already faced gas curtailment for 120 days in the current calendar year, meaning SNGPL has stopped supply for more than 90 days, stipulated in gas connection contracts.

The gas suspension for three days a week has affected 40% of production capacity, sparking fears that a continuous disruption will leave around four million cotton bales unutilised.

Cotton growers are already under pressure as mills are not in a position to purchase two million bales.

Talking to Aptma leadership including Central Chairman Mohsin Aziz, the petroleum minister clarified that the government had planned gas curtailment for power plants, and not the textile industry, to ensure uninterrupted supply during the ongoing Rabi season.

According to Aptma’s top members, the industry is under financial stress because of 40 per cent idle capacity amid energy shortages and demanded withdrawal of three-day-a-week gas suspension plan. Instead, they said, the government should provide new gas finds of 200 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) to the textile mills, which consume 300mmcfd on SNGPL network.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 22^nd, 2011.