The pottery industry is taking its last breathing because many units have been closed due to lack of incentives, government support and un-resolved problems being faced by the industry since long.
According to a survey conducted Business Recorder's Correspondent in Gujrat most of the manufacturers expressed their fear that rapid closer of pottery units would create unemployment crisis as result of which four to five thousand skilled and semi-skilled industrial workers would become jobless.
The pottery industry is famous and oldest industry of Gujrat but its advancement and growth has become stagnant due to lack of notice of concerned departments.
The owners of pottery industrial units were confronting with the multifarious problems as a result of which they were considering to close their units.
They painted out that major reason of closure of pottery industrial units was the excess billing of Sui gas. Many a time the issue of excess billing was raised with the concerned authority but no remedial step was taken in this regard.
The business community engaged with pottery industry was fully capable to improve the standard and quality of its pottery manufacturing in accordance with the international standard and at present the pottery industry was fulfilling the domestic demands despite of serious hurdles and hardships.
The other main reason of the decline of home-made pottery was the bulk varieties of smuggled crockery from different foreign countries in the domestic market. Apart from this, another cause of demur was the plastic made crockery, which was lashing the earthenware industry of the country badly.
The plastic made crockery is being used in most of the small restaurants and especially in catering services. They urged upon the concerned authorities to take immediate and appropriate steps for the survival of the pottery industry and avoiding the large-scale unemployment caused by the closer of earthenware industries.
They streamlined the need of obtaining modern technology from Japan, France and China for the promotion and expansion of domestic pottery industry. At present the business community of pottery industry is using outdated technology, they added.
Expressing the full confidence they said that government will pay proper heed on resolving the problems being faced by the industry as well as for its advancement.
They called upon the government to announce reduced tariff of Sui gas for the pottery industry for brining it out of crisis.
Meanwhile, the Institute of Ceramics is successfully functioning in the area since 1965 and providing guidance and assistance to the small and medium pottery industry. The purpose behind the setting up of Institute of Ceramics is to provide processed raw material to the small industrialists and potters at comparatively cheaper rates. It will provide common facilities to the private sector, to extend training facilities to the unskilled and semi-skilled factory workers aimed at up-grading their technical know-how. It can help solve technical problems of the industry and to test the suitability of available indigenous ceramic raw materials and work out necessary process to make good use of them.
The Institute of Ceramics has introduced some short courses of four to six months in various technologies to meet the industrial requirement. The Ceramics raw material like Quartz, Feldspar, Calcite, Dolomite, Nepheline, Syenite and China Clay have been discovered with the help of Institute of Ceramic Gujrat, which was now being used by the ceramics industry throughout the country. Apart from this a huge deposit of China Clay has also been found in Murtazabad, Hunza and Sindh areas.
The overall pottery manufacturers were of the opinion that government should take appropriate steps for stopping the smuggling of crockery for infusing the new blood in ceramics industry of the country as well as announce special incentives and concessions for the promotion of the earthenware industry.