MACRO ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS
The bread industry in Pakistan has seen many changes in the last twenty-five years. It has emerged as a small-scale bakery processing industry to numerous industrial bread making units all over Pakistan. The bread industry in Pakistan is flourishing very quickly and bread products are gaining much popularity. Bread has been accepted as a popular substitute of rice, naan, chappati, paratha. Currently, 5% of the total population of Pakistan consumes packaged bread. The major factors for such a low percentage of people consuming bread are mostly economical and cultural. Pakistani diet consists of many substitutes for bread, which are cheaper and preferred over bread by a majority of the population.
The political scenario as well as the legal scenario is not posing any threat to the bread industry¡¦s growth apart from the price restrictions, which actually fixed by negotiations between the government of Sindh and the committee of bread-making companies. The government is very enthusiastic about industrialization in the country and wants the foreign sector and private sector to take part in it. So any move towards industrialization and standardization is being encouraged, which should ideally suit the existing as well as new comers in the packaged goods industry.
However the ground realities are a bit different since all the wealth is being concentrated in the hands of few and middle class is not emerging as fast as it is emerging in other Asian economies, which is one of the reasons that only 5% of Pakistan¡¦s population consumes bread.
Inflationary pressures are affecting the prices of raw-materials. The increase in rates of wheat from Rs1065 to Rs1120-1130 in the last three weeks has pushed up the price of atta No.2.5 to Rs980 ...