Leather footwear centre opens in Hyderabad
The Hyderabad Leather Footwear Centre (HLFC) was inaugurated in India on 26 January, 2012, to promote the production of leather shoes locally and to discourage imports of footwear.
The representatives of Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (SMEDA), Sindh Small Industries Corporation (SSCI) and Hyderabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (HCCI), jointly performed the inauguration.
General manager of SMEDA, Muslim Raza, said that Pakistan needs 40 million shoes and sandals per year. Most of the local demand is currently met through imports from China, Mr Raza said.
“The local people have skills and experience of manufacturing quality footwear and they only needed to be equipped with the proper equipment to be able to produce the good in the required numbers,” he said.
Mr Raza said the HLFC was equipped with machinery for manufacturing shoes and hand-made small footwear manufacturing units for training the staff.
Senior vice president of HCCI, Turab Ali Khoja, said that the business community was happy on the revival of footwear industry in Hyderabad after almost two decades. “It is an old industry of Hyderabad but attention was not given to its development earlier,” he said.
The program was attended by Muhammad Junaid, project manager at HLFC, Zeeshan Ahmed, project director at HLFC, Syed Yawar Ali Shah and Adnan Khan, members board of directors at HLFC, Abdul Saleem Arain, vice president of HCCI and other businessmen.
