The Furniture Sector in Pakistan: Export performance and ... - TRTA i

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high-quality hardwoods like walnut and oak are available, fully legal and environmentally sustainable (certified wood). Wood seasoning Kiln-drying should be made the industry standard for wood seasoning. The smallest operated local kilns are 5-10 m 3 chambers built on site with local materials, and equipped with ventilation, control and fan equipment from a local manufacturer or from abroad. A kiln-drying operation could become a popular business of its own, charging fees on the basis of actual drying time and volume plus direct energy costs. Probably this type of concept would have to be located inside existing furniture clusters in order to ensure sufficient client base. It should also be studied whether Australian-made solar kilns or combination kilns (solar plus mechanised ventilation) could be made available at a reasonable cost. These have been installed in small-scale wooden crafts communities across South-East Asia. Tool maintenance Dedicated workers for tool-maintenance with a small separate workshop or room would be needed to upgrade this activity to a more professional level. High-precision tool doctoring equipment should take over from traditional self-made maintenance appliances. The need for mechanical trimmers of sawing and planer equipment becomes more crucial when capacities of such equipment are being enhanced. Training of workforce A mandatory contribution from all employers towards a “Human Resource Development Fund” would be a commendable means of providing training and upgrading for the workforce in the industry. It would enable the use of foreign experts, and complement in-house training programmes. The use of contract workers from abroad should be limited, because such workforce is highly mobile and retard labour productivity growth. Further, employers will be reluctant to provide training as these workers will leave when their tenure expires. Stable workforce is crucial for greater value addition in the furniture industry. Hence, without such workforce, the research and development (R and D) activities, especially those related to design and development is hindered. Design Access to foreign designs (if this is desirable) can be improved with distribution of home decoration magazines, mail order catalogues, and similar media that display a wider range of products. Internet can be a potentially rich resource of design trends and ideas, but it is not effectively used without some basic training. The fastest way to improve design awareness is to assign one computer-savvy design student or young designer to facilitate access to Internet-based designs in the furniture exporters association. This could also happen as the first step of an exchange programme with some foreign design school. It may be more difficult to attract business-like design trainers, because of the small size of the Pakistani industry. 84 International Trade Centre
A short-term but maybe a costly measure is to bring a foreign designer into Pakistan. Visiting designers can be sought for in the exchange programmes of foreign design schools and institutions in the main markets (Europe, USA). Aid to Artisans and similar NGOs can facilitate the training courses of foreign design teachers in furniture clusters. In the long term, training of Pakistani designers at foreign art schools and universities, etc. should be considered. From the UN-family, UNIDO has arranged design assistance in wood products previously, and it could be consulted for the case of Pakistan. Finishing and lacquering There are some institutions in Europe, like Rosenheim University in Germany, who organise training courses for furniture makers from all over the world to study and practise the most recent finishing techniques, sanding and polishing of wood. Pakistan could tap this opportunity to upgrade its furniture finishing. Moreover, one of Rosenheim scholars is based in University Putra Malaysia (UPM), and could be approached for tailor-made courses. He is one of the founders of the International Furniture Research Group (IFRG), earlier mentioned in this report. If hand painting and lacquering were still widely applied, investments into a compressor-based spray-gun painting would be warranted to improve finishing and economise on paint/lacquer consumption. Acquisition of a more powerful compressor would further improve surface finishing and increase the final value of products. Some clients may insist on environmentally or health-wise friendly lacquers and paints, too. Emission safety, as well as food safety for kitchen/dining furniture range, is therefore to be maintained at required standard levels. One key requirement would be to install a clean painting/spraying room with recovery of airborne lacquer remnants. This would not require a big space or investment. The actual space requirement depends on the size of individual products, and on the numbers of items manufactured. Usually the typical SME workshops need only 5-10 square meters to start a spraying room. The fan system for recovering the loose sprays of lacquer, and cleanliness of the finishing environment, would dramatically lower the chemical consumption and improve final quality. Market information There are numerous case studies and manuals for establishing a specific Market Information System (MIS) to facilitate small producers’ access to commercial details and product requirements for their products. For example, FAO has produced and field-tested a manual for developing small-scale community enterprises, and supply of market information was one of the key components. Although it has been developed for agro and forestry products, its methodology could be adjusted to furniture and crafts. The establishment of such a system is not an easy task. And keeping such system operational on the basis of membership fees or similar financial contributions is far from simple. Based on the past experiences, there are a number of very fundamental decisions to be taken if a market information system will be developed. These may include, but not restrict to, the following (Table 4.1). International Trade Centre 85
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The Furniture Sector in Pakistan
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Acknowledgements The report was pre
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Abbreviations AFTA AHEC AKTRIN APFE
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Table of contents Acknowledgements
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Box 3.1 Multilateral discipline of
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Executive summary This study sets t
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the extent possible maintain or imp
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1 Background and objectives 1.1 EC
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2 Furniture sector in Pakistan 2.1
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On the buyer’s side, there are gl
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According to the websites of import
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Global demand for furniture in main
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suppliers, both domestic and other
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Table 2.3 Pakistani furniture expor
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Figure 2.4 Distribution structure f
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freight rates have increased and do
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Price The prices of local machinery
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Indonesia has also announced a ban
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industry itself should support effo
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various counterparts, the supplier
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Box 2.7 UK Timber Trade Federation
Page 43 and 44: Figure 2.5 Simplified example on ch
Page 45 and 46: At least 70% of the wood used in ma
Page 47 and 48: Scope of joint ventures There exist
Page 49 and 50: • With FAO’s Forest Products an
Page 51 and 52: The contact information of many of
Page 53 and 54: Box 2.10 USAID initiative in the fu
Page 55 and 56: Opportunities Major opportunities m
Page 57 and 58: pressure on the price. There appear
Page 59 and 60: Pakistan does not export this furni
Page 61 and 62: 3.1.3 Functional scope The function
Page 63 and 64: Current status of efforts to libera
Page 65 and 66: 3.2.2 Information flow-upwards, i.e
Page 67 and 68: Commission (EC/EU) has established
Page 69 and 70: Figure 3.3 Relevant intensity of WT
Page 71 and 72: Box 3.2 Regional Trade Agreements (
Page 73 and 74: Trade Related Aspects of Intellectu
Page 75 and 76: Agreement on the application of san
Page 77 and 78: country or materially retards the e
Page 79 and 80: Relevance of the furniture sector T
Page 81 and 82: 3.4.2 Other countries’ access to
Page 83 and 84: Table 3.2 Top 10 buyers of the Paki
Page 85 and 86: Arabian market. Here again, there i
Page 87 and 88: • Material from China is being us
Page 89 and 90: 4.2 Obstacles and shortcomings - im
Page 91 and 92: Raw material recovery Raw material
Page 93: • Consistent policy for supportin
Page 97 and 98: 5 Export services in Pakistan 5.1 E
Page 99 and 100: 5.1.3 Federation of Pakistan Chambe
Page 101 and 102: • Pakistan International Freight
Page 103 and 104: The lessons learnt here could be re
Page 105 and 106: 6 Conclusion and recommendations 6.
Page 107 and 108: 6.2 Critical success factors • A
Page 109 and 110: 6.4 Global value chains 6.4.1 Poten
Page 111 and 112: Benefits All timber tends to be air
Page 113 and 114: • Optimise cutting; • Calculati
Page 115 and 116: 6.6.5 If we had US$100,000: A techn
Page 117 and 118: • To modernise such a laboratory,
Page 119 and 120: Annexes Annex A — Sources of info
Page 121 and 122: • Federmobili information on the
Page 123 and 124: • National Home Furnishings Assoc
Page 125 and 126: International Trade Centre 115
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