Industry Ministry: Damage to Public, Private Industrial Sectors Exceeds 336 bln SP

(ST) – The value of the damage to the industrial public sector due to the current crisis, according to preliminary statistics, amounted to 155.354 billion pounds until the beginning of March this year, the Ministry of Industry revealed in a report.
The report of the ministry, published recently in the local daily (al –Watan), indicated that “direct damage exceeded 53 billion Syrian pounds, while indirect damages reached to 72.3 billion pounds.”
“The crisis has led to the withdrawal of 49 companies, laboratories and facilities affiliated to the Industry Ministry of the production process because of vandalism, in addition to the cessation of 14 companies before the crisis,” according to the report.

The number of industrial establishments that came out of the production process because of sabotage, according to the report, is 1209 industrial installations distributed, in Damascus and its countryside 267 facilities with a damage amounted to 46 billion, in Aleppo 866 facilities with a damage amounted to 205 billion, in Homs 14 facilities with a damage amounted to 846 million pounds and in Hama 62 facilities.
“The damages suffered by the private industrial sector up to 31/1/2014 in Damascus and its countryside, Aleppo, Homs, and Hama worth at about 254.77 billion Syrian pounds,” the report revealed.
The Industry Minister, Kamal  Eddine Tomah, announced  in November, that the value of direct and indirect damages suffered by the Syrian industry, both public and private sectors since the beginning of the crisis until the month of October, according to available data, reached 336 billion Syrian pounds.
Rehabilitation of the Syrian industry falls into two items: the first deals with emergent procedures required to stop the deterioration of the industry at the moment and return the cycle of production, and the second deals with the process of rehabilitation and modernization of the Syrian industry in the post-crisis period, according to official statements.
Earlier in March, the volume of the damage as a result of the crisis amounted to 4.7 trillion Syrian pounds, or more than 31 billion dollars, official reports revealed.
“The government is working to provide funding for the reconstruction of the state budget, without relying on loans or subsidies from other destinations, where the government has allocated 30 billion Syrian pounds for reconstruction and compensation to those affected in the last year and for the current year 50 billion Syrian pounds of the state budget,” the sources added.
The Reconstruction Committee approved, earlier this year, emergency plans in 2014 for a number of ministries in order to work on infrastructure rehabilitation and reconstruction of facilities and utilities, which were vandalized an damaged, while it announced that the value of the damage caused by the crisis in the country amounted to about 3250 billion Syrian Pounds.

Sharif el -Khatib