Pakistan's business leaders are pressuring the authorities to ease the blanket 35 per cent margin recently imposed on import letters of credit (L/Cs).

In May the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) imposed the margin on most import L/Cs as one measure in the central bank's battle to tame the country's spiralling inflation (DC World News, 29 March 2008).

Exemptions

The SBP governor, Dr Shamshad Akhtar, has said that the central bank and the government will look into industry demands to exempt essential industrial raw materials from the mandatory 35 per cent cash margin on L/Cs.

The governor's remarks were made during discussions with a delegation from the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI), which visited the central banker last week.

Assurances

FPCCI representatives had told Dr Akhtar that since the L/C margins were imposed, businesses across several sectors were facing severe working capital shortages.

The governor assured the business leaders that the central bank would look into the matter and asked the FPCCI delegation to submit a list of raw materials that it considered should be exempt from the L/C margins.

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