In Pakistan, local smartphone assembly has increased over the past few years. In an effort to reduce local pricing for phones, several large businesses, including Samsung and Xiaomi, have established their mobile phone assembly facilities here.
According to a report by the Express Tribune, local phone assembly may, unfortunately, end soon as numerous plants are close to shutting down. Due to a lack of dollars since May 20, letters of credit (LCs) for import are not being opened. As a result, there is a severe shortage of the raw materials required for assembly.
In a statement, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) claimed that import payments had not been halted and that commercial banks had sufficient dollar liquidity to cover all obligations. So far this month, the interbank market has processed import payments totaling $4.7 billion.
Naturally, this is giving many OEMs and their business divisions cause for concern. According to Aamir Allawala, CEO of Tecno Pack Electronics:
Unfortunately, the industry has now depleted all of its raw resources and closed 80% of its operations. Nearly 50,000 workers’ jobs in the sector are in jeopardy.
This will eventually stop the production of cheap mobile phones that are locally made, and only people who can afford imported phones will be able to purchase them. According to ICT specialist Parvez Iftikhar, we would have to bid farewell to our aim of becoming a mobile phone exporter.
