Since the last few months, many mobile industries have been unable to operate due to raw material shortages, dollar shortages, and inability to open letters of credit. Transsion Tecno Electronics has been forced to shut down its operations in the country due to the current situation, and is one of the mobile phone manufacturers that have shut down their operations.
It is worth mentioning that Transsion Tecno Electronics, a joint venture between China and Pakistan, has contributed a great deal to the Pakistani economy ever since it was established. Muhammad Azfar Ahsan, who was the former Minister of State and Chairman of the Investment Board of Pakistan, strongly brought this issue to the attention of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif in a letter that he wrote to him. There is no doubt that the mobile phone industry is facing a very difficult situation in Pakistan and that he expressed his concern over it.
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Transsion Tecno started its operation in 2019 as part of the China-Pakistan friendship initiative under CPEC Phase II’s B2B cooperation program. There were 12 Chinese managers and 400 Pakistani engineers employed by the company, along with 2500 male and female employees. This company produced 300,000 smartphones per month.
It is not only Transsion Tecno Mobile that has to face this fate here in Pakistan, many other global brands such as Samsung, Xiaomi, Vivo, Oppo, Nokia, Tecno, Infinix and Itel are also experiencing this kind of hardship at the moment.
This closure of manufacturing facilities has resulted in the country not only experiencing layoffs as a result of the closure, but also having a detrimental effect on the country’s economy. The former Minister Muhamamd Azfar Ahsan recently revealed that the mobile phone manufacturing industry needs USD 100 million per month in order to keep functioning with just 50% of its capacity compared to the previous years. In this way, 35,000-40,000 direct and indirect jobs will be retained, resulting in 35,000-40,000 jobs being saved in total.
Additionally, he stressed the necessity of immediate intervention at this point in order to provide foreign exchange that will restart this industry’s operations and relieve the pressure on its laborers.
It is undeniable that the mobile manufacturing industry is the backbone of the economy. However, if this issue is not addressed on time, all hope will go out of our hands and even our dream of a ‘Made in Pakistan’ initiative will fall flat. There is a need to tell the world with sudden measures that Pakistan is still a ripe land with a multitude of opportunities, and we also need to maintain the trust of foreign and local investors with these sudden measures. There are a number of things that the government can accomplish if it takes immediate action in this regard.
