According to FPTA, increased exports of paper and paperboard caused a "material shortage" domestically that caused prices to soar, wrong propaganda by IPMA on print & social media

According to FPTA, increased exports of paper and paperboard caused a "material shortage" domestically that caused prices to soar, wrong propaganda by IPMA on print & social media

- Misleading Information and Wrong Propaganda by Indian Paper Manufacture Association (IPMA) on various Print and Social Media's across India
- The Indian Paper Manufacturers have exported a huge Quantity in multifold of various products led to a shortage of material in domestic market.

Mumbai | 3rd June 2023 | The Pulp and Paper Times:

Federation of Paper Traders' Associations of India (FPTA) is a Federation of 37 Associations across India and comprising of more than 6000 + Paper Traders situated across India, has claimed that misleading information and wrong propaganda on various Print and Social Media's across India spread by Indian Paper Manufacture Association (IPMA) in last few weeks on Surge in Paper Imports.
In its representation to Directorate General of Foreign Trade, FPTA says that we would like to state for IPMA's Wrong Propaganda / Misleading Information to Government of India and General Public at large. IPMA has gone to the extent of changing the parameters to suit their logic, from quantity to value. Surprisingly prior to this IPMA never spoke in terms of value.

According to the latest data issued by the Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence & Statistics (DGCI&S) in May, Indian imports of paper and paperboard have jumped 47%, from INR 7,839 crores in FY 2021-22 to INR 11,513 crores in FY 2022-23.  Indian Paper Manufacturers Association (IPMA) stated in its release that imports of paper and paperboard into India have significantly increased in the last three years, in spite of adequate domestic production capacity. 

On the other side, FPTA stated that The Statistics for the imports as compared by IPMA for the year 2021 - 22 and surge in 2022 - 23 are partially correct and project a different story altogether. The imports are compared to Corona Times to the last financial year. The data must be compared to the Precovid times to the present when normal times.

According to the table below, Import of paper and paperboard have come down to 1,752 thousand tonnes in FY 21-22 as compared to 2991 thousand tonnes in FY 19-20 ( precovid), which decreased by 41 per cent in two years. The exports of paper and paperboard have increased to 2857 thousand tonnes in FY 21-22 as compared to 1662 thousand tonnes in FY 19-20.

IPMA stated that due to surging imports, most small and medium paper mills in India are commercially unviable, jeopardising the livelihoods of thousands of farmers engaged in agro / farm forestry and supplying wood, the primary raw material, to paper mills. 

“The story is different from what they are propagating as per the Graph or Data by DGCI&S. The Indian Paper Manufacturers have exported a huge Quantity in multifold of various products. The above chart clearly shows that exports in FY 2020 -21 and 21-22 were to the tune of 2,194 and 2,857 thousand tonnes as compared to imports of 1,747 and 1,752 thousand tonnes. Due to material exports in the Last Financial Year, there was a shortage of material and the rates per tonne were skyrocketed more than double in just a year from 2021 - 22 to 2022 -23 and availability was an issue which hampered the Businesses of various Indian industries of Make in India project.” FPTA said.

FPTA also stated the breakup of imports and exports for FY 2O21-22 quality-wise. The net figure for imports of paper and paperboards is only 1,146 thousand tonnes as 606 thousand tonnes is newsprint which is regulated by separate norms of the Government of India and do not form part of the open trade.

The representation states that It should also be noted that as per the statistics of Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Government of India, and shared by Indian Pulp & Paper Technical Association (IPPTA) the exports of paper and paperboard in the FY 21-22 were to the tune of 3.53 million tonnes as against imports of 2.18 million tonnes. The Department of Promotion of Industry & Internal Trade (DPIIT) annual reports for 2Q22-2023 also publishes the above numbers and thereby provides authenticity to the data.

“However, in FY 2022-23 the exports of paper and paper including newsprint were to the tune of 2.46 million tonnes as against imports of paper and paperboard including newsprint to the tune of 2.52 million tonnes. Imports of newsprint being 0.62 million tonnes the net figure of imports for paper and paperboards comes to 1.90 million tonnes, much below the exports of 2.46 million tonnes. One needs to compare apples with apples only and not oranges.” FPTA says.

ln 2O21-22 there was restrictions of imported Copier Paper due lo BIS certifications was mandatory for the Suppliers of imported Copier. As we have short supplies of Copier Paper in India to the required demands. BIS registrations were completed by Foreign Suppliers in 2022-23 so there was marginal increase of imports to 2021-22.

Some Other Facts of IPMA as under to consider:

-IPMA represents only 15 manufacturers as against a total of 900 out of which 553 are operational, a mere 1 .66 per cent. (DPIIT Annual Report 2022-23 for FY 21-22).
- IPMA members have an installed capacity of 4.826 million tonnes as against the total installed capacity of 30.73 million tonnes (DPIIT Annual Report 2022-23 for FY 21-22) having a share of only 15.704 per cent
-IPMA members domestic sales are to the tune of 3-710 million tonnes as against the production ol 22.50 million tonnes (DPIIT Annual Report 2022-23 tor FY 21-22), having a share of 16.488 per cent. 
-IPMA had a capacity utilization rate of 89.55 per cent as against the industry's 87 per cent. (DPIIT Annual Report 2022-23 for FY 21-22)

FPTA stated that IPMA has projected a shortfall of 2 million tonnes of pulpable wood even after more than eight decades of presence of the domestic industry. IPMA also projects a Recovery Rate of a mere 38 per cent as against 68 per cent in United States and more than 70 per cent in Europe. These facts itself proves the lack of initiative towards improving the recovery rate and growing wood to make the country "AtmaNirbhar. lf at all the domestic players were to have taken even a small towards the above the Government of India would not have to spare  precious foreign exchange of 2,06,920 million rupees on imports of pulp and wastepaper to the tune of 7.81 million tonnes in FY 2022-23. (Source of this data in Ministry of Commerce & Industry as circulated by IPPTA).

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