The government has established Rs 5 billion Khushhal Pakistan Fund (KPF) to undertake the development projects at small level, which would be increased gradually. "The basic purpose of this fund is to help alleviate the poverty as mega projects have little employment impacts, Adviser to Prime Minister on Finance, Revenue & Economic Affairs Dr Salman Shah said here on Friday.
He was speaking at an evening with the newly elected Council of Institute of Chartered Accountants of Pakistan at ICAP House.
The adviser said that the KPF along with Rs 20 billion allocated for Khushhal Pakistan Programme (KPP) in this year budget would focus on community-level projects. "The government has planned to create three million jobs through community-based projects to reduce the gap between haves and have-nots.
Emphasising the need for creating more jobs, Dr Salman pointed out that employment growth did not match with the rapid economic growth of 8.4 percent, achieved in last fiscal year.
He mentioned that employment problem could only be tackled if the country moves on with the sustainable economic growth in the next 15 to 20 years.
"We are going to spend a lot of money on small projects, which could be completed in six to nine months at community-level with the ultimate goal of generating more and more jobs, the adviser added.
Dr Salman, while referring to international trends, said that war against terrorism was overshadowing the world's economic growth and there was a need that Pakistan should integrate with the world economies to keep momentum of growth.
He said that economic growth is linked with competitiveness and elimination of inefficiencies with the increasing inputs of value addition and human resource development.
"We need to invest lot in mobilisation and development of human resources as it is a vital part of economic growth."
The adviser said that reshaping of world trade after WTO is opening the markets and now it is up to Pakistan how it positions itself to benefit from the free-trade regime opportunities.
"We should integrate with world economy and get the share in world trade to pass on the benefits to our people," he said.
Describing the technology as key element in new era, Dr Salman mentioned the fact that those who adopted the new technologies are on the forefront of development, as it also brings down the logistic cost.
Referring to infrastructure development, the adviser held it as one of the key elements for economic growth and regretted that it is in bad shape in almost all Pakistan cities.
"We are investing in infrastructure and the government has initiated many projects in this regard", he said.
Regarding agriculture sector, Dr Salman said that major part of population lives in rural areas and is dependent on agriculture, which is future's potential sector and added that with the deregulation in this sector, more opportunities could be generated. In reply to a question, Dr Salman said that positive things are happening on investment front, as foreign investors are looking at Pakistan for investment.
Comments
Comments are closed.