Pakistan, especially NWFP, possesses huge marble reservoirs. The promotion and development of marble industry could bring prosperity and development for the country.
But industrialists and officials from Pakistan Stone Development Company (Pasdec) and small & medium enterprises development authority (Smeda) say that the sector suffers from several maladies.
“The marble industry is suffering from load-shedding, low voltage, law and order problem, use of outdated quarrying techniques, inconsistent supplies of raw material, lack of proper infrastructure, lack of value addition and absence of public-private cooperation/coordination,” they point out.
According to an official of Pasdec, that oversees the marble sector, Pakistan has approximately 300 billion tons of marble reserves scattered mainly in NWFP, the tribal belt and Balochistan.
Around 98 percent of these reserves are believed to be in NWFP and FATA. Of late, work at several marble sites was stopped due to militancy in the area. Explorations in tribal-belt would be started once the security situation improved there and the figures could further improve. Much of the potential however hitherto remains to be exploited,” said the official.
He said nearly 30 kinds of marble were found in the province and the adjoining tribal belt. “The most famous of these are Ziarat marble, super-white, off-white, Badal, Zebra, pink, Nowshera, Jet-black, Bampokha and golden marble,” he added.
Swat, Buner, Chitral, Kohistan, Mardan, Hazara, Nowshera and Kohat divisions are high potential areas for quality marble in the province. Mohmand, Khyber, Bajaur, Orakzai and Kurram Agencies from Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) have huge marble reservoirs.
In the next 15 years, Pasdec plans to upgrade 14 quarries, develop 20 marble cities and 2000 marble factories and establish 20 training centres of mosaic, inlays and stone masonry across the country.
Model quarries are being set up according to the best international practices for extracting stone and employing latest technology. Marble Cities are being established in the vicinity of mines all over Pakistan.
The Ministry of Industries has opened a machinery pool at the newly established marble city Risalpur with the help of Pasdec.
According to Shahid R Khan, former chairman all Pakistan marble industries association (APMIA), the marble city will have a common facility and training centres (CFTCs) for training local managers, workforce and technicians to cut square dimension blocks into slabs, then polish and cut them to size on the state of the art machinery. The centres will be run by both local and International experts. “CFTCs will also have a Mosaic Development Center to provide industrial training in marble mosaic, handicrafts and inlays from industrial waste. The common facility will provide cutting, polishing and sizing services as well on reasonable rates to private entrepreneurs. There would also be an industrial park on the site,” he said.