According to statistics released by Pakistan’s Federal Bureau of Statistics, the country’s leather sector exports fell by 6.77% to $74.967 million in April from $80.417 million in March 2006. The decrease was largely due to a fall in the exports of leather garments, which declined 38.49%.

A breakdown of the figures showed that the country exported finished leather worth $19.716 million, leathergoods worth $45.489 million and footwear valued at $9.762 million compared with $19.799 million, $52.526 million and $8.092 million respectively in the previous month. This showed that finished leather exports decreased by 0.42%, whilst leathergoods fell by 13.40%. The footwear sector, however, recorded growth of 20.64%month-on-month.

On a more positive note, Pakistan’s leather exports performed well in the period July 2005 to April 2006, reaching $907.329 million compared with $754.846 million in the corresponding period of the prior year—an increase of 20.20%. During this period Pakistan exported 13,281,000 pairs of footwear worth $13.423 million (which include leather footwear exports worth $89.385 million, canvas footwear at $3.019 million and other footwear at $12.422 million) an increase of 12.85% compared with the 13,423,000 pairs at $97.379 million reported in same period a year earlier.