OUR fertiliser industry has long been suffering because of the high taxes being imposed on this sector. Higher taxes raise the cost of production, and reduce the price-competitiveness of locallyproduced fertilisers.

The government has also imposed a `gas infrastructure development cess` (GIDC), on industrial sectors. Thus, the fertiliser sector, being the biggest consumer of natural gas, is subject to the highest rate of GIDC. This is a financial burden placed on fertiliser companies .

According to the GIDC legislation bill 2015, revenues generated by the cess will be used for developing large-scale gas-infrastructure projects.

A key agricultural input, like fertiliser, has also been subjected to a high rate of general sales tax (GST), while most other agrarian countries continue to give healthy subsidies andincentives to their agriculture-related industries.

Industry leaders have have repeatedly expressed their concerns about high taxation rates on this key industry, thus causing the country to lose out on various opportunities to export our fertilisers and earn precious foreign exchange.

Only if farmers get urea at economical rates, they can achieve high crop-yields and our major export industries like textiles, sugar, flour and foodstuff will also prosper. Thus the government must give more support to the fertiliser sector to reap economic benefits and avoid imports of costly fertiliser.

Muhammad Sagheer Islamabad