Government of Pakistan established National Tariff Commission (NTC) in 1990 as per NTC Act of 1990. The functions of the NTC includes tariff measures or other form of assistance for:

• Providing protection to the indigenous industry;
• Improving the competitiveness of the indigenous industry; and
• Promoting exports from Pakistan.

While examining any application for tariff protection, before recommending any relief for the applicant domestic industry, NTC would ensure that:-

• The quality of the product to which such protection or assistance is to be given is good.
• The applicant industry would not need the protection or assistance after a reasonable period of time.
• The additional cost to the consumer or user industry will not be excessive.

OUR SERVICES

While providing services to our clients in tariff related matters, we perform in the following manners:

• Assisting the domestic industry to prepare and file the prescribed NTC questionnaire which includes data/information relating to tariff and tax related problems faced by the industry and relief sought by the industry; Import & domestic tariff & taxes on the finished product as well as the raw materials; Installed capacity, production and sales of the domestic industry; Size of domestic market and means through which the total demand is being met for the last three years from the date of the application; Employment provided by the local industry; Break up of production/selling cost for the last three years from the date of the application; Sales price for the last three years from the date of the application; Landed cost of imported product from major sources for the last 3 years from the date of the application; Any other costing/pricing information about the competing industry, if any etc.
• Attending hearings and making oral and written submissions on behalf of the client before the NTC.
• Preparing and submitting comments on submissions of other interested parties before the NTC.
• Responding various queries of NTC during the investigation.
• Assisting the client in on-the-spot investigation by the officials of the NTC and making comments on the NTC draft report of the visit, before finalization of the said report.
• Liaison with different Government Authorities till decision of the case.

DEALING WITH PROTECTION CASES UNDER NTC ACT, 2015:

To achieve the purposes prescribed in the NTC Act of 1990 the NTC initiates investigations either on an application from the domestic industry, a directive from the Government or on suo moto basis. For all such cases, the NTC requires specific information/data from the affected domestic industry according to prescribed questionnaire.

We assist our clients in filling of the prescribed questionnaire. For the purpose, On the basis of industry data and import data of the concerned product, indepth economic and financial analysis is made by our experts. With reference to this analysis an arguable case is prepared and presented to the NTC to achieve the desired objective of requisite tariff protection for our client. Till the finalization of the case, We pursue with the NTC for the provision of any additional information, clarification or removal of deficiency, if pointed out by the NTC. Thus, usually within a period of 4-5 months, NTC makes recommendations which are finally approved by the Government.

We have successfully dealt with tariff protection cases of following industries under the NTC Act:

Lotte Chemical Pakistan Limited:

Lotte Chemical Pakistan Limited is the only domestic producer of PTA in the country. PTA is mainly used in textile value chain industry. Duty rate on PTA was drastically slashed based on a study conducted by the National Tariff Commission. In the said study, it was also proposed by the NTC to review this duty for further reduction after a period of 2-3 years. The PTA Industry hired our services for review of its tariff. We not only succeeded to stop further reduction, but based on our analysis the NTC recommended an increased duty rate which was finally approved by the Government. Thus, the tariff protection of PTA industry has been enhanced to a sustainable level.

Pharmaceutical Companies:

A number of pharmaceutical companies including Hilton Pharma, Tabroz Pharma, Sami Pharma, Mactor Pharma etc. hired our consultancy services for representing them before the NTC for tariff protection purpose. We prepared and filed a well-argued case on behalf of these firms and achieved the desired objective.

All Pakistan Textile Mills Association – APTMA

We represented APTMA before the NTC and defend its tariff related position in a befitting manner.

We are also representing following clients in a study on Tariff Rationalization of Textile and Chemical sectors being conducted by the National Tariff Commission, Government of Pakistan vide its notice F. No. 3(10)/2014/NTC/TR dated September 08, 2014:

Olympia Chemicals Limited, Lahore

Purechem

Lotte Chemical Pakistan Limited, Karachi

Pakistan Yarn Merchants’ Association – PYMA

Nimir Chemicals Pakistan Limited, Lahore

Nimir Industrial Chemicals Limited, Lahore

A.T.S Synthetic (Pvt.) Limited, Lahore

Tufail Chemical Industries Limited, Karachi

Ranyal Industries (Pvt.) Limited, Lahore

In addition to the above, we have been assisting a number of clients, to safeguard their business interest in connection with the Free Trade Agreements and Preferential Trade Agreements being reviewed by Pakistan with its trading partners, by making reason and research based representation before various ministries including Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Industries etc.