'Duty on PTA imports will harm Indian polyester industry'.

Industry experts claim that the anti dumping duty levied on Purified Terephthalic Acid (PTA) imports in India is likely to harm the Indian polyester industry.

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry issued a notice levying anti dumping duty on June 19, 2014 for import of PTA from China, Korea, Thailand, and European Union (EU).

While speaking to Fibre2Fashion correspondent Mary Christine Joy, Mr. D K Nair, Secretary General, Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI) said, "The duty will actually harm the Indian polyester industry. We have to substantially diversify into manmade fibre based products, for which we need competitive polyester fibres. This anti dumping duty will push up PTA prices, so fibre will also be costlier."

"We are already not exporting too much of manmade fibre based products, and if PTA prices go up, our export condition will further worsen," he adds.

On a similar note, Mr. M S Bhageria, President, PTA Users Association remarks, "Anti dumping duty will increase the overall cost of all polyester raw materials like polyester chips, polyester filament, polyester staple fibre, polyester fabrics, and polyester garments."

"This duty will result in a closure of small scale industries of APP 20000 units in India," he remarks.

"There are some apprehensions that there may be a shortage of cotton because of the monsoon failure. If this happens, the industry should find it easy to shift to manmade fibres. But if we also make the manmade fibres costly by anti dumping duty, it will create a difficult situation," DK Nair concludes.

Source : fibre2fashion.com