Umar Ahsan Khan, CEO of Dawlance, told the Senate Standing Committee on Finance on Wednesday that the company is losing Rs. 500 million per month due to non-opening letters of credit (LCs).
The committee, chaired by Senator Saleem Mandviwala, was informed that as a result of the non-opening of LCs, the company, one of Pakistan’s major household appliance manufacturers, has fired 1,000 employees.
The Dawlance CEO also told the committee that if the LCs are not opened, the company will be forced to lay off another 2,000 workers. Khan stated that only 38% of the company’s LCs were opened in September of this year, and the situation was no different in October.
Khan stated that a Turkish firm has invested $590 million in Dawlance. He added that investors in Bangladesh are helped in every way possible to open such factories, and that if the situation does not change, foreign investors will shift their capital to other countries.
Dawlance is Pakistan’s leading manufacturer of innovative home appliances and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Arcelik, Europe’s second largest manufacturer based in Turkey.
Dawlance congratulated all Turkish citizens on the occasion of the 99th Turkish Republic Day, which commemorates Pakistan-Turkey relations.
Every year, the Turkish Republic Day is celebrated at the Dawlance headquarters to commemorate the historic events of October 29, 1923, when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the Republic of Turkey’s founding father, initiated a rigorous programme of political, economic, and cultural reforms in Turkey.
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