(January 13-2023)
Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum, and All Karachi Industrial Alliance, and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain on Friday said arrangements should be made for the better and timely use of the ten billion dollars to be received by Pakistan as a result of the Geneva Conference.
The relevant laws should be changed according to international standards, the incompetent and lazy officers should be kept away from this matter and transparency should be ensured under all circumstances, he said.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that if the donors are not satisfied, the efforts can be wasted as witnessed in the past.
Talking to the business community, the veteran business leader said that the government had announced projects worth 16 billion dollars 3 years before the Geneva conference, now more than 10 billion dollars will be provided by the international community and Pakistan will be spending about $5 billion annually on rehabilitation of flood victims, protection of people from natural disasters and construction of infrastructure.
This money will circulate in Pakistan’s economy, improving GDP and generating employment opportunities, he underlined.
Presently, the country is suffering from climate change, malnutrition, water scarcity, pollution and the destruction of farms, which deserve the full attention of authorities.
The process of institutional reforms has to be initiated. It is difficult but not impossible for governments of different parties in different provinces to agree on a single plan because all parties should know that delaying these matters for a long time would be suicidal, he observed.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that delay and losses in important projects is considered a normal process in Pakistan which will be unbearable for donors.
At present twelve hundred projects worth 1.6 trillion rupees are pending, the size of which is more than PSDP, he informed.
Therefore, the government should improve planning, construction, procurement and approval rules should be made according to international standards so that losses are reduced and the private sector can participate in it and donors can better monitor all the projects.
The business leader said that the disappointment of any donor would have a negative impact on the rest of the donors which will cause loss for Pakistan.
Pakistan is the fifth largest country in the world in terms of population. The first four countries generate forty-five percent of the world’s GDP, while Pakistan’s share in the world’s GDP is only 0.4 percent, which is further reduced after the floods.
