Pakistan Steel suffers Rs16bn loss in 10 months, down from Rs2.8bn profit last fiscal

[Naveed Yaseen]

Last year it earned a profit of Rs2.83 billion

Thursday, July 16, 2009
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) reported a loss of Rs16.06 billion in the first ten months (July-April) of fiscal 2008-09 compared to profit of Rs2.83 billion in the corresponding period of last year, says a performance report of public sector industrial units on Wednesday.

Ministry of Industries & Production (MOIP) has projected whole year losses at Rs15 billion.

Pakistan Steel has requested a multi-billion-rupee bailout package from the federal government to overcome these gigantic losses.

The industrial units in aggregate (excluding non-operational) reported a loss of Rs1.58 billion during months under review compared to the profit of Rs2.96 billion in the corresponding of last year, it added.

Heavy Electrical Complex reported a loss of Rs67 million compared to profit of Rs177 million in the same months of last year while State Engineering Corporation (SEC) and Sindh Engineering earned a profit of Rs87 million and Rs82 million against the profits of Rs216 million and Rs81 million in the same period of last year, performance data said.

Similarly the overall production index of all corporations and units registered a decrease of 12 per cent due to low output of Sindh Engineering, Heavy Electrical Complex, Heavy Mechanical Complex and Pakistan Steel, said the data.

Production of raw steel in Pakistan Steel reduced by 114,230 tonnes while the same trend was notices in other products excluding coke of the Pakistan Steel, it said.

Aggregate production of SEC units decreased by 0.44 per cent while production of Dong Feng vehicles registered a declined by 48 units, the data concluded. —AM

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