The country’s “financial wizards” are in for a nightmare due to the country’s decreased cotton production, which has decreased by more than 40% primarily due to climate change and floods. The country’s cash-strapped textile industry will need to import about 7 million cotton bales to meet demand this season.
Only 4.8 million bales of white lint are anticipated to be produced this year, resulting in a 7 million bale increase in cotton import demand. Up to this point, 5 million bales of import contracts have been signed.
As of December 1, the Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) announced that the cotton crop was still 40.28 percent lower than the previous year’s harvest, a worrying decrease of 2.9 million bales. In comparison to this year, Pakistan produced more than 7.168 million bales before the beginning of December in 2016.
At least 4,900 bales of cotton were exported during this time period, which is 11,100 bales or 69.38 percent fewer than the 16,000 bales exported during the same time period last year. In comparison to 3.19 million bales purchased last year, or 46.56 percent fewer, textile mills purchased approximately 3.568 million bales this year. Ginners’ stock has increased to 0.767 million bales from 0.473 million bales, or a 49.25 percent increase.
The country would only be able to produce about 4.8 million bales this season, and 6 to 7 million bales will need to be imported to keep the textile mills operating, according to Naseem Usman, head of the Karachi Cotton Brokers Forum.
He said arrangements had been struck for importing around 5 million bales of cotton, citing importers. Javaid Suhail, the leader of the PCGA, attributes the sharp fall in cotton production to climate change, notably the severe rains and flooding during the monsoon. Floods affected at least 79 percent of the cotton growing region, particularly in Sindh, which prevented the ginning facilities’ gates from opening this year.