Frequent load shedding has cut industrial production by nearly half at Gopalganj BSCIC Industrial Estate, where factories are experiencing around five hours of power outages during the 11-hour working period each day.
Production at the estate normally runs from 9:00 am to 8:00 pm. As most factories depend heavily on electricity, frequent outages are disrupting production, while owners still have to pay workers their full wages. As a result, industrial units are incurring significant losses, with plastic factories reportedly bearing the brunt.
According to the Executive Engineer’s Office of West Zone Power Distribution Company (WZPDCL) in Gopalganj, the BSCIC feeder has a daily demand of around 2 megawatts, while only 1-1.25 megawatts is being supplied.
Sujan Das, industrial estate officer of Gopalganj BSCIC, said the estate has 74 industrial plots, of which 61 currently have operational units. These include wooden and steel furniture factories, pulse mills, automobile and engineering workshops, polymer industries, oil mills, puffed-rice and sanitary-product manufacturing units.
He said frequent load shedding had reduced production across the estate, while voltage fluctuations were damaging machinery. Factory owners were also paying workers despite production remaining suspended. “We have started working with the relevant authorities to ensure uninterrupted power supply to the BSCIC industrial estate,” he added.
Kazi Hasan, director of Khan Industries, which operates three plastic-related units, said its machines require about two hours to heat up before production can begin. However, electricity often goes off and returns every hour.
“When the power goes out, the machine temperature drops to zero. Raw materials are damaged inside the machines, workers remain idle and production stops. This causes losses on three fronts,” he said.
Hasan said the company’s polymer units had suffered the most. A machine screw worth around Tk 250,000 was damaged and will have to be imported from China, taking about 15 days.
Imam Hasan, director of Sharif Furniture, said voltage fluctuations had caused losses of around Tk 300,000. He said five to six hours of load shedding during the factory’s 11-hour working period had reduced production to about 45%.
“Workers sit idle during outages, but we still have to pay them. Furniture supplies to showrooms have also declined alarmingly,” he said, demanding uninterrupted daytime power.
Bidhan Biswas, proprietor of Moni Engineering Workshop, said hourly outages had severely disrupted production of rice-husking machines and agricultural equipment. Production during the first 12 days of this month had fallen by half.
Lutfar Rahman Luthu, proprietor of Lutfar Rahman Pulses Mill, said power shortages had reduced production and prevented the mill from meeting market demand.
Mohammad Iqbal Hossain, owner of Gopalganj Motors, said electricity was essential for automobile servicing. “Without electricity, almost everything at the BSCIC estate comes to a standstill,” he said.
Mohammad Moin Uddin, executive engineer of WZPDCL’s Gopalganj town electricity supply office, said the town’s nine feeders have a combined demand of 18 megawatts, while only 8 to 9 megawatts are supplied from the national grid.
He said the power situation had started improving on Thursday and assured that special attention would be given to the BSCIC feeder.
