Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: The imports of the overall machinery group witnessed an increase of 6.36 per cent during the first five months of the current fiscal year (2023-24) compared to the corresponding period of the last year, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported.
The total imports of the machinery group during July-November (2023-24) stood at $ 2,935.576 million against the imports of $2,760.055 million during the same period of the last year.
The import of agriculture sector machinery and equipment surged by 60.76 per cent from $19.784 million to $31,804 million; office machinery including data processing equipment 57.11 per cent from $129.909 to $204.095 million; construction and mining machinery by 3.87 per cent from $33.260 million to $34.546 million; electricity machinery and apparatus 17.10 per cent from $778.902 million to $912.073 million; telecom related equipment 74.36 per cent from $455.625 to $794.445 million; mobile phone 112.20 per cent from $290.550 to $616.541 million and other apparatus 7.77 per cent from $165.075 million to $177.904 million.
However, during the period under review, the import of power-generating machinery declined by 26.24 per cent from $ 243.135 million to $ 179.337 million; textile machinery by 73 per cent from $212.786 to $56.803 million; and other equipment by 18 per cent from $886.654 million to $722.473 million.
Meanwhile, on a year-on-year basis, the machinery group imports increased 9.17 per cent during November 2023 compared to the same month of last year, from $ 534.863 million to $583.926 million.
On a month-on-month basis, the machinery imports into the country came down by 15.95 per cent during November 2023, compared to the imports of $694,762 million in October 2023, according to the PBS data.
