Marble exports shine

Marble exports increased by 45 per cent in the first 10 months of the current fiscal year compared to the year-ago period.

Sanaullah Khan, the chairman of All Pakistan Marble Mining Processing Industry and Exporters Association, said the country fetched around $70 million in July-April 2013-2014 compared to $48 million in the same period of last fiscal year.

He said the major export destinations were China, Afghanistan, Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Canada, Cyprus, Egypt, Georgia, Germany, Greece, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Korea, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Mozambique, Mauritius, the Netherlands, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Senegal, UAE, UK, Vietnam, US and Angola.

Khan said the main market remained China, which bought semi-finished products, with a share of 50pc of total exports. The rest of the countries usually imported finished marble from Pakistan.

More than 90pc of total exports are made from Balochistan and Karachi. Due to rising demand in world markets, the number of marble exporters in Pakistan has grown substantially.

He said if industries got uninterrupted electricity, the exports could increase manifold. He added that industries in Karachi were facing six-hour announced and six-hour unannounced load-shedding.