A prominent member of the Executive Committee of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Adeel Siddiqui, has openly condemned the highly deteriorated state of industrial infrastructure across the Sindh province, highlighting the severe neglect facing the Hyderabad and Kotri industrial estates. In a detailed public declaration, the business leader revealed that the operational conditions within these critical production zones remain thoroughly deplorable. This stagnation persists despite the provincial administration collecting more than Rs 1.5 trillion through an infrastructure cess levied on national imports over the preceding five-year timeframe.
The senior trade representative, who additionally serves within the leadership council of the ruling Businessmen Panel Progressive group inside the apex chamber, emphasized that domestic manufacturers are already enduring extreme macroeconomic challenges at the federal level. These systemic pressures include exorbitant energy tariffs, unpredictable interest rate fluctuations, and an increasingly convoluted tax administration model. Yet, despite these heavy operational burdens, the provincial government of Sindh has consistently failed to supply even the most fundamental municipal amenities and civic services to its primary manufacturing zones.
According to the chamber representative, the foundational road networks winding through the Hyderabad and Kotri Sindh Industrial Trading Estate sectors have broken down entirely, creating immense hazards for the thousands of heavy cargo trucks and freight containers traversing these routes daily. Industrial enterprises are experiencing deep financial losses stemming from extensive logistical delays, severe vehicle deterioration, and heightened safety risks for transport staff. The current state of these transport corridors was compared to an active conflict zone, with modern logistics operations forced to navigate deep potholes and completely fractured pavement surfaces.
The business community is now demanding absolute transparency regarding the specific utilization of the 1.85 percent infrastructure cess imposed on incoming import shipments over the years. Given that this specialized levy was introduced with the singular mandate of constructing and maintaining robust industrial logistics, manufacturers are questioning the apparent disappearance of these massive public funds. The business leadership noted that the provincial taxpayers and active industrialists are owed a comprehensive, formal explanation from the provincial cabinet regarding why these massive financial collections have not translated into visible development inside the Hyderabad and Kotri zones.
The ongoing structural deficiencies have plagued the historic Hyderabad industrial territory for decades, forcing localized units to sustain essential production lines without reliable water access, functional drainage pipelines, or centralized effluent treatment facilities. Established originally in the mid-twentieth century across more than twelve hundred acres of land, the specialized zone houses approximately 665 distinct manufacturing plants, though only about 450 units maintain active daily operations. The vast majority of these facilities support the agricultural economy of lower Sindh by processing vital food commodities including edible oils, various pulses, and regional rice varieties.
While localized management officials acknowledge that certain internal road rehabilitation projects valued at Rs 1.10 billion have recently commenced after a ten-year hiatus, experts agree that these delayed interventions will fall short of addressing the massive structural deficit. Compounding the broken logistics, severe industrial water scarcity is forcing multiple factories to either artificially downscale their daily production capacity or procure expensive water deliveries from private commercial tankers. This added financial burden has driven up operational overheads, making local goods significantly less competitive in both domestic and regional marketplaces.
In response to this worsening industrial decline, the business leadership has formally petitioned the top political hierarchy of the province to urgently establish a specialized provincial investment facilitation body modeled after the federal Special Investment Facilitation Council. Such an institution must be equipped with complete administrative and financial autonomy to directly remediate provincial bottlenecks including water distribution, security networks, and municipal management. The chamber warned that without an immediate, high-level political intervention and physical site inspections by top provincial executives, industrialization across Sindh will face an irreversible downturn.
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