The leather industry has been struggling to attract new investments even though the government had designated leather ‘Product of the Year 2017’.The exports of leather and leather products fell significantly in the current financial year FY 2018–19 in the July–January period compared to the previous fiscal year 2017–18 (July–January). Most of the tannery owners blamed the lack of product variety and lack of vigilance on part of the tannery estate for hurting the growth prospects of the sector. They also said the environment has been badly affected at Savar as a result.According to the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB), the sector registered a negative growth rate of 11.71 per cent, resulting in earnings of USD 626.42 million in the current financial year 2018–19 (July–January). This figure was USD 709.51 million during the same period of the 2017–18 (July–January) FY.Shaheen Ahmed, chairman of the Bangladesh Tanners’ Association (BTA), told The Independent that in 2013, leather prices went up in the world market, and since then, renowned leather manufacturers in the world started producing artificial leather products to address global demand.“Because of continuous negative growth for a long period of time, we are losing foreign and local investment,” he added.Secondly, he said, “China used to take raw hide from us to produce raw material by carrying out further processing. The US government has signalled an imposition of 25 per cent tariff on a number of Chinese products (including leather) entering the US market. Eventually, this affected us badly and China stopped taking raw hide from us.”Ahmed also said 155 factories have been shifted to Savar. Of these, 125 factories are running and 25 tanneries have fully started their operations but are processing only crust leather.He explained that this sector is not getting the advantage of the Central Effluent Treatment Plant (CETP) and is struggling hard to achieve global standards in terms of compliance. A Chinese contractor was given the responsibility and work order to build the CETP and the dumping yard but the work has not been completed yet, he said.A sub-power station with a 10MW generation capacity was built in the Savar Tannery Complex, he said. Moreover, it can generate a maximum of 5 megawatt (MW) power from the sludge to operate the CETP if the project is implemented. The power can also be used for other functions like production work, he added.BTA members said the construction of administrative buildings and fire stations has been completed. Also, drains, deep tube-wells, water delivery pipelines, culverts, electricity lines and gas lines have been already been laid.“Hence, the situation will change. We will see positive growth if the CETP is ready and fully functional,” said Ahmed. Only leather footwear registered a slight positive growth rate of 7.35 per cent, resulting in earnings of USD 384.30 million. This figure was USD 357.98 million during the same period in the 2017–18 FY.
