The well-performing mobile phone sector in Pakistan is in danger of collapsing, jeopardizing 40,000 jobs.
Industry participants claim that given that mobile phone assemblers are unable to open the necessary number of letters of credit (LCs) to meet their raw material needs, the current scenario is substantially different from that of early last year.
Completely knocked down (CKD) parts for the assembly of mobile phones were allowed to be imported under a quota of $80 million for domestic assemblers. In this case, the shutdown of the manufacturing lines could result in the layoff of up to 40,000 workers in the sector.
Syed Aminul Haque, the federal minister for IT and telecommunication, claimed in a statement that 19.7 million mobile phones and smart devices worth Rs 9.7 billion were created in Pakistan in 2022 using assembly lines.
