PBC crusading for reforms

When they weren out waging wars over beliefs, the Knights Templar of the 12th Century managed the economic infrastructure and early banking industry across Europe.
Considering this crucial, yet oft overlooked aspect of the duties performed by the knights, the Pakistan Business Council may be considered their modern-day rendition for the local economy. That is, of course, if one conveniently overlooks the plethora of differences between the crusaders and our business-suit clad private sector giants.
So what economic genius have the members of the council conjured up now? A panel of experts put together by the PBC has published a position paper titled, "Integrated Energy Planning and Pakistans Energy Future", outlining necessary measures for addressing the countrys growing energy demands.
The document contains recommendations that can alleviate the country from its current energy-deprived position.
The path defined by the document is clear. Firstly, it suggests that the government should divide users of natural gas into two broad groups. The first group should be comprised of the power generation sector and industries, while the second group should include commercial and domestic users as well as users of CNG (read cheap motorists).
The PBC has rightly argued that the priority of allocation of the countrys gas supplies should be based on the economic value of output from each of these groups as well as other factors including the resulting contribution to exports and job creation.
Similarly, they have called upon the government to stop doling out gas connections to every desolate village of the country, instead relying on solar power to serve such far-flung areas.
It has also called for the privatisation of gas distribution system and raising domestic gas tariffs so that users are forced to conserve resources.
The position paper contains dozens of other suggestions for improving the efficiency of transmission and distribution systems as well as for enhancing the capacity of the power generation sector; not the least of which entails reigning in the governments tendency to spend what it does not have.
The energy crisis costs Pakistan nearly 2 percent of GDP, and if appropriate investment of nearly $2 billion is made, it will payback within a year and save billions to the exchequer.
But the biggest hurdle to all these measures, as rightly highlighted in the report, is the lack of political will to take non-populist measures. In fact, this lack of motivation among policy makers is the biggest reason for, "unfinished structural reforms (that) continue to raise risks to a sustained economic revival."
The simple fact is that while the brunt of the impact of policies formulated by politicians is felt by corporations and individuals alike in urban centres, their voter-base is predominantly made up of rural populations.
No wonder politicians shun progressive reform in favour of crowd-pulling rhetoric.
So, even though the PBC and numerous other economic experts have repeatedly implored the government to redress its energy policy on war footing, their calls have amounted to little more than hot air.
It appears logical then, that these voices of reason must first rise over the din of political rambling. The public-private partnership model being touted for financing development projects must first be applied to the political ideologies of the nations representative parties.
Perhaps it is time that the knights step outside the council and help evangelise reforms to the masses along with politicians so that the latter can then enact these changes without fear of political suicide.