KARACHI: Association of Builders and Developers (ABAD) on Tuesday demanded the government to withdraw regulatory duty on import of steel bars in order to stabilize prices in the domestic market.
ABAD Chairman Fayyaz Ilyas rejected recent price hike in iron bars and said that the construction industry and Naya Pakistan Housing scheme will suffer due to increasing price of iron bars.
He has demanded of the government to abolish Regulatory Duty (RD) and Additional Regulatory Duty (ARD) on steel import to maintain stability of steel prices.
Chairman ABAD said that construction industry was ignored by consecutive governments since seven decades but the present government of Prime Minister Imran Khan, understanding the importance of this industry for economic development, has announced a special package for the revival of the construction industry in particular and national economy in general.
“But, with the restart of construction activities, steel manufacturers have raised prices of steel bars- an important component for construction- many times, making construction more and more costly,” he added.
The new price of iron bars has reached to its highest level of one lac 42 thousand rupees per ton with the recent price hike of Rs 5000 per ton, which is not acceptable, he said.
He demanded of the federal government to abolish Regulatory Duty and Additional Regulatory Duty on import of steel bars to stabilize steel bars price so that construction industry could flourish and the dream of the Prime Minister of constructing 5 million houses for people from lower strata of the society could be realized and national economy could be strengthened.
