The trade barriers between India and Pakistan have diluted to some extent in the aftermath of the floods in the region, as the international agencies engaged in relief work in Pakistan placed orders with the Indian outfits to source relief material.
The recent flood in Pakistan, one of the worst in recent years is estimated to have displaced 20 million people in the country.With millions of people affected, the demand for relief blanket have went up, resulting in international relief organisations placing huge order for relief blankets.
Couple of textile companies in Amritsar claim to have received orders from international relief organisations like International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) and other relief organisations to supply blankets in Pakistan.
‘Trade for Aid’ is how Amit Mehra proprietor of Amritsar based Parag International firm which is into the business of manufacturing and exporting relief blankets, term the business.
Based in Amritsar, it is the manufacturer and exporter of quality blanket like relief blankets, charity blankets, aid blankets, disaster blankets, emergency blankets, airline blankets, hospital blankets, hotel blankets, army blankets, police blankets, institutional blankets, traditional blankets, domestic Blankets, synthetic blankets, tartan blankets to various organisations, NGO’s , traders, suppliers, army, police and allied sectors.
The company has recently shipped a consignment of 50,000 blankets to a client based in Middle East, who further would be directing it to Pakistan.The export of blankets to Pakistan is directly not allowed through road as only limited items are traded through the land route.
The company has installed capacity of manufacturing 150,000 blankets a month and is running at full capacity. We have recently received order for supplying 1,70,000 blankets to Pakistan in the next 15-30 days. We have urged the company to extend the deadline till 60-90 days because the consignment could not be completed till then.
“Apart from hiring additional workforce, job has been outsourced to smaller manufacturers which are assisting us in the work. As we are unable to supply the order ourselves we have outsourced some job work to 15-20 small manufacturers in the region who would be assisting us in the operations,” said Mehra.
