Business
Power minister voices dismay over lack of consultation | The Express Tribune
ISLAMABAD’:
The minister for power has expressed concerns over ignoring the Power Division while providing electricity consumption data of shipbreaking and recycling processes for tariff categorisation and determination by the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra).
The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet, in a recent meeting, held discussions on declaring shipbreaking and recycling as an industry. It directed the Maritime Affairs Division to consult the Power Division while gathering data of electricity consumption in shipbreaking and recycling for tariff categorisation and determination. The power minister expressed reservations that the Power Division had not been consulted to ascertain the total electricity consumption by the shipbreaking sector, which was essential.
The Ministry of Maritime Affairs recalled that the ship recycling facility at Gaddani, Balochistan had once been the third largest in the world. The sector has largely been operating informally without being officially given the industry status. However, the shipbreaking and recycling sector has been accepted as an industry by the Balochistan Development Authority.
The ministry said that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), on the recommendation of the Engineering Development Board, had notified Customs General Order No 04/2022 containing a list of locally manufactured goods for providing exemptions and concessions from duties and taxes under the concessionary regimes/SROs for items not manufactured locally. The Pakistan Ship Breakers Association was the only entity manufacturing re-rollable and re-meltable scrap through ship recycling, adding value and providing direct employment to 20,000-24,000 skilled and unskilled workers at Gaddani, along with indirect employment to scores of women in the surrounding areas.
The ministry explained that the re-rollable scrap was the key raw material for re-rolling to produce construction bars. Owing to its mild steel composition and strength, it has also been the primary raw material for hundreds of cottage industries, operating in Punjab and across the country, producing thousands of tools and hardware items for industrial and domestic use.
It is also used in the manufacturing of wire rods and agricultural implements. The re-meltable scrap (HMS 1&2) is consumed by steel melting furnaces, including large steel manufacturing units, to produce ingots, billets and re-bars.
The ministry added that Pakistan had acceded to the International Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships 2009, known as the Hong Kong Convention, in November 2023. The convention aims to ensure that ships, when recycled at the end of their operational life, do not pose unnecessary risks to human health, safety or the environment. It deals with environmentally sound recycling of ships, the establishment of safe facilities for hazardous material disposal and the welfare of workers engaged in ship recycling. The Hong Kong Convention was set to take effect on June 25, 2025. Therefore, the formal declaration of ship recycling as an industry was necessary to implement the convention within the given timeframe.
The Ministry of Maritime Affairs requested the Ministry of Industries and Production to initiate the process for granting industry status to shipbreaking and recycling.
The Ministry of Industries responded that there was no specific legal criterion to determine which sector could be declared as an industry. However, as per precedent, each request for such a declaration is submitted by the relevant ministry to the federal cabinet through sharing a summary with the ECC. The Ministry of Maritime Affairs told the forum that a summary seeking the ECC’s approval was submitted to the cabinet on March 26, 2025. The cabinet called for obtaining views of the relevant stakeholders, including the ministries of commerce and finance as well as the FBR. These stakeholders supported the proposal.
In light of that, the ministry recommended that the shipbreaking and recycling sector should be formally declared an industry to enhance the local manufacturing of re-rollable and re-meltable scrap and to comply with the standards set by the Hong Kong Convention. The ECC’s approval was sought for the proposal, which considered the summary submitted by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and approved the proposal.
1729471601-0/image-(8)1729471601-0-640x480.webp "Pakistan’s crisis differs from world | The Express Tribune")
Business
Stock Market Live Updates: Sensex, Nifty Hit Record Highs; Bank Nifty Climbs 60,000 For The First Time
Stock Market News Live Updates: Indian equity benchmarks opened with a strong gap-up on Monday, December 1, touching fresh record highs, buoyed by a sharp acceleration in Q2FY26 GDP growth to a six-quarter peak of 8.2%. Positive cues from Asian markets further lifted investor sentiment.
The BSE Sensex was trading at 85,994, up 288 points or 0.34%, after touching an all-time high of 86,159 in early deals. The Nifty 50 stood at 26,290, higher by 87 points or 0.33%, after scaling a record intraday high of 26,325.8.
Broader markets also saw gains, with the Midcap index rising 0.27% and the Smallcap index advancing 0.52%.
On the sectoral front, the Nifty Bank hit a historic milestone by crossing the 60,000 mark for the first time, gaining 0.4% to touch a fresh peak of 60,114.05.
Meanwhile, the Metal and PSU Bank indices climbed 0.8% each in early trade.
Global cues
Asia-Pacific markets were mostly lower on Monday as traders assessed fresh Chinese manufacturing data and increasingly priced in the likelihood of a US Federal Reserve rate cut later this month.
According to the CME FedWatch Tool, markets are now assigning an 87.4 per cent probability to a rate cut at the Fed’s December 10 meeting.
China’s factory activity unexpectedly slipped back into contraction in November, with the RatingDog China General Manufacturing PMI by S&P Global easing to 49.9, below expectations of 50.5, as weak domestic demand persisted.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 slipped 1.6 per cent, while the broader Topix declined 0.86 per cent. In South Korea, the Kospi dropped 0.30 per cent and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was down 0.31 per cent.
US stock futures were steady in early Asian trade after a positive week on Wall Street. On Friday, in a shortened post-Thanksgiving session, the Nasdaq Composite climbed 0.65 per cent to 23,365.69, its fifth consecutive day of gains.
The S&P 500 rose 0.54 per cent to 6,849.09, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 289.30 points, or 0.61 per cent, to close at 47,716.42.
Osmond ChiaBusiness reporter
Getty ImagesSouth Korea’s largest online retailer, Coupang, has apologised for a massive data breach potentially involving nearly 34 million local customer accounts.
The country’s internet authority said that it is investigating the breach and that details from the millions of accounts have likely been exposed.
Coupang is often described as South Korea’s equivalent of Amazon.com. The breach marks the latest in a series of data leaks at major firms in the country, including its telecommunications giant, SK Telecom.
Coupang told the BBC it became aware of the unauthorised access of personal data of about 4,500 customer accounts on 18 November and immediately reported it to the authorities.
But later checks found that some 33.7 million customer accounts – all in South Korea – were likely exposed, said Coupang, adding that the breach is believed to have begun as early as June through a server based overseas.
The exposed data is limited to name, email address, phone number, shipping address and some order histories, Coupang said.
No credit card information or login credentials were leaked. Those details remain securely protected and no action is required from Coupang users at this point, the firm added.
The number of accounts affected by the incident represents more than half of South Korea’s roughly-52 million population.
Coupang, which is founded in South Korea and headquartered in the US, said recently that it had nearly 25 million active users.
Coupang apologised to its customers and warned them to stay alert to scams impersonating the company.
The firm did not give details on who is behind the breach.
South Korean media outlets reported on Sunday that a former Coupang employee from China was suspected of being behind the breach.
The authorities are assessing the scale of the breach as well as whether Coupang had broken any data protection safety rules, South Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT said in a statement.
“As the breach involves the contact details and addresses of a large number of citizens, the Commission plans to conduct a swift investigation and impose strict sanctions if it finds a violation of the duty to implement safety measures under the Protection Act.”
The incident marks the latest in a series of breaches affecting major South Korean companies this year, despite the country’s reputation for stringent data privacy rules.
SK Telecom, South Korea’s largest mobile operator, was fined nearly $100m (£76m) over a data breach involving more than 20 million subscribers.
In September, Lotte Cards also said the data of nearly three million customers was leaked after a cyber-attack on the credit card firm.
Agency workers hired to cover Birmingham bin strikers will join them on picket lines on Monday, a union has said.
A rally will be held by Unite The Union at Smithfield Depot on Pershore Street, Birmingham, on Monday morning to mark the first day of strike action by agency refuse workers.
Unite said the Job & Talent agency workers had voted in favour of strike action “over bullying, harassment and the threat of blacklisting at the council’s refuse department two weeks ago”.
The union said the number of agency workers who will join the strike action is “growing daily”.
Strikes by directly-employed bin workers, which have been running since January, could continue beyond May’s local elections.
The directly-employed bin workers voted in favour of extending their industrial action mandate earlier this month.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Birmingham council will only resolve this dispute when it stops the appalling treatment of its workforce.
“Agency workers have now joined with directly-employed staff to stand up against the massive injustices done to them.
“Instead of wasting millions more of council taxpayers’ money fighting a dispute it could settle justly for a fraction of the cost, the council needs to return to talks with Unite and put forward a fair deal for all bin workers.
“Strikes will not end until it does.”
Stock Market Live Updates: Sensex, Nifty Hit Record Highs; Bank Nifty Climbs 60,000 For The First Time
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