Plastics industry urges PM to set up Petrochemical regulatory authority

Chennai, Dec 6 (Agency) Heads of ten leading plastics associations in the country has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to set up a Petrochemical regulatory authority to save Plastics processing industry hit by dramatic increase in price of Raw Material (Resin) by the Raw Material manufacturers in the country. In the letter to Mr Modi, the plastic manufacturers, processors demanded constitution of a regulatory authority to curb the consortium, undue profiteering in the petrochemicals industry which has left the plastic manufacturing/processing industry in the lurch and is on the verge of complete collapse. The industry associations have also demanded to stop imposing anti-dumping duty, mandatory BIS standards, decrease import duty on raw material and ban/restrict export of raw material from the country to enable the plastic industry to survive and remain competitive with other countries like China. They urged Mr Modi to urgently constitute the Petrochemical Regulatory Authority and ensure that the PSUs like IOCL, GAIL, BPCL support the domestic processing units by serving them in a fair manner and fair pricing mechanism. Mr Arvind Mehta, Chairman Governing Council of The All India Plastics Manufacturers Association (AIPMA), said the industry which was already facing severe drop in the demand due to the COVID pandemic, was further facing working capital and related financial issues owing to the exponential increase in cost of the raw material. The growing threat of increased imports of plastics intermediate and finished goods from countries like China would prove to be a disaster to Mr Modi’s vision and plan to make India ‘Atmnirbhar’.