Country’s earnings from crust leather export in the last three months of the just concluded financial year 2016-17 witnessed about 53 per cent negative growth as the production of the item was heavily disrupted in the period due to a relocation process of tanneries.The government had cut the utility services to tanneries located at Hazaribagh in capital Dhaka on April 8 this year in compliance with a High Court directive to speed up the long-awaited tannery relocation to the newly constructed Leather Industrial Park at Savar, on the outskirts of the capital.According to the Export Promotion Bureau data, export earnings from crust leather in the April-June period of FY17 declined by 52.70 per cent to $31.56 million from $66.73 million in the same period of FY16.The data showed that the crust leather export in the last three months of FY16 had declined by 28.71 per cent to $66.73 million from $93.61 million in the same period of FY15.Sector people said that export earnings from crust leather had been on the decline in the July-March of FY17 but the situation worsened after the disconnection of gas, water and power supply to tanneries located at Hazaribagh in April.Before cutting the utility services to the tanneries, export earnings from crust leather in the July-March period of FY17 fell by 4.79 per cent to $201.05 million from $211.17 million in the same period of FY16.Earnings from leather and leather products in July-March of FY17 grew by 8.41 per cent to $922.96 million from $851.33 million in the same period of FY16.In April-June of FY17, export earnings from leather and leather products registered a minimal 0.46 per cent growth to $311.04 million from $309.62 million in the same period of FY16, the EPB data showed.‘The utility cut hit hurt the sector as a good number of tanneries are yet to start production in the new location,’ Bangladesh Tanners Association chairman Shaheen Ahmed told New Age on Thursday.He said that crust leather production would face disruption one more year as the tanneries were not getting gas connection after their relocation to resume production of the product.Shaheen said that leather goods and footwear maintained its export growth in the period as exporters imported crust leather to retain market share in the globe.He said that only six to seven tanneries got gas connection and were producing crust leather in the Leather Industrial Park at Savar and most of the factories were producing wet blue leather.Export earnings from leather and leather products in FY17 grew by 6.29 per cent to $1.23 billion from $1.16 billion in FY16, data showed.
