Energy crises, lawlessness: industrialists', traders' conference from March 14

Shahid Naseem Khokhar, President of Multan Chamber of Commerce & Industry (MCCI) has said that the deteriorating law and order, energy crisis and erroneous polices of the government have obliterated national economy and it was the requirement of the hour to organise a national conference of economic experts and stakeholders like industrialists, traders, exporters, manufacturers, growers and policymakers in this regard.
"Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry took the initiative to organise the third All Pakistan Chambers Presidents Conference on March 14, 15 at Bhurban to formulate agenda to stabilise country's economy. I shall take part in this conference InshaAllah, in which around 40 chambers' presidents from all over the country will participate," he added.
Khokhar said that owing to the feeble law and order, foreign investment has reduced to zero percent. Due to the same situation, local investors are shifting their businesses and assets to the neighbouring countries and till date, almost 20 industrial units have been shifted to Bangladesh, he revealed.
He also said that increase in the discount ratio is the second major cause of low investment. Ratio of discount rate in Pakistan is 14 percent which is very high from the neighbouring states, as in Bangladesh, it is five percent, Sri Lanka 7.5 per cent, Japan three percent, US 0.25 per cent, UK 0.50 per cent, Malaysia 0.3 per cent and Thailand one percent, he maintained.
President MCCI noted that the cost of doing business in Pakistan is very high. He said that the prevailing energy crisis has badly affected the industry and surge in the prices of petroleum products has almost destroyed it. "A total of 1,332 industrial units have been shut down because of the energy crunch and if the situation remains so, there is a chance that around 1,600 industrial units can be closed and 1.6 million people would lose their jobs", he said.