Steel scrap production comes to a halt

[Naveed Yaseen]

* Green signal for re-rollable steel import has brought the demand of local steel scraps to zero

By Moonis Ahmed

KARACHI: Pakistan’s ship breaking industry is witnessing unabated cycle of stagnation as the production of steel scraps has almost come to a stalemate, ship breakers told Daily Times on Monday.

They said that following the news of allowing of re-rollable steel import in the country the demand of local steel scraps has come to zero and there is a big risk of unemployment of thousands of workers.

President, Pakistan Ship Breakers’ Association (PSBA) Dewan Muhammad Rizwan Farooqui said that since June 2008 around 56 medium and small ships have been anchored on the Gadani shipyard but now after the allowing of steel import the industry is in deep crisis.

He said that the ship breakers have set the target to produce around 500,000 LDT steel scraps by the end of the fiscal year as the local demand of ship billets and scrap metals has surged sharply since last year, but owing to this news the situation has become worse.

He said that downfall in construction and engineering sectors has decreased the demand on one hand and on the other, decreasing international prices of steel raw materials has also depleted the industry’s need sharply.

Farooqui said that presently, around 7,000 workers are earning their livelihood at Gadani dockyard and with this decline in pace of work the number of employment will decrease.

PSBA president informed that in 2007, Pakistan’s ship breaking industry generated 152,260 LDT steel and metal scraps through dismantling of 34 various sized ships at Gadani. However, in the last 10 years, it had noted remarkable performance as since 1999 it had produced 926,067 LDT scraps by breaking up 64 different sized vessels. The industry had contributed Rs 3.53 billion to the national exchequer on account of taxes and duties.

He reiterated that lack of necessary infrastructure facilities including roads, utilities like electricity, drinking water or any arrangement for providing first aid or medical help to the workers are the major issues of the industry’s labour.

He said in the ’80s, the ship breaking industry had seen its peak and was called the biggest industry in the world. In this period, it provided employment to over 30,000 workers directly, while over one-half of a million people earned their living indirectly, through trade and industries, which used ship scraps as raw material.

In 1985-86, the ship breaking industry helped the country in making an annual saving of Rs 1,500 million, which would otherwise have been spent on import of iron and steel.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...2009_pg5_1