Energy crisis: a common challenge for South Asian region, says Qamar

Federal Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Syed Naveed Qamar has said that Pakistan was facing severe energy crisis and it is a common challenge for entire South Asian region.
Speaking at the concluding session of the Sustainable Development Policy Institute's (SDPI) thirteenth annual conference, 'Peace and Sustainable Development in South Asia: the way forward' here on Thursday the minister said that we have to ensure peace for improving quality of life, security and development in Pakistan and South Asia.
Qamar added that Pakistan is going through a paradigm shift from single-minded governance to participatory and consultative governance under the 18th amendment. He said that there is strong need of social safety nets like Benazir Income Support Programme, which is a useful initiative and the government is making all possible efforts to reduce poverty among the most vulnerable segments of the society.
Dr Tariq Banuri, of Department of Economic and Social Affair (DESA) of United Nations speaking on the historical context of development, said that there are three determining factors for future scenario 2050, which included economic growth, demography and resource allocation. He said that the optimistic vision for future depends only on ensuring people's sustainable development through environmental, economic and equitable development process while options for renewable energy provide real hope to achieve such goals.
In the panel on relationship between food insecurity, poverty, militancy and conflict experts including Dr Abid Qayyum Suleri, Dr Bishnu Upreti and Dr Ayesha Siddiqa agreed that the food insecurity and poverty were some of the key factors that perpetuate extremism and conflict. However, they added that there is need of more research and empirical evidence to establish this nexus.
Bishnu Raj Upreti of Nepal giving her presentation on "Food Insecurity in Unstable and conflict-Ridden Countries: Reflections from Nepal" said that food insecurity and conflicts have direct relationship. She maintained that food insecurity and conflicts have multiple impacts in every field of life. She said that conflict impact on production leads to hunger, reduces food production, and impedes economic growth, which was observed in Nepal.
Reciprocally, food insecurity resulted in fuelling the conflict, lands of landlords were captured by rebels as they left village and rebels collected landlords' share from the tenants. Bishnu said that due to conflicts production and productivity decreased as productive lands are either uncultivated, under-cultivated or cultivated with no or low investment, adding that in Nepal rebels distribute confiscated lands to poor people but they were not able to utilise these lands because of fear from state security forces.
She said that food insecurity is a cause of conflict and conflict a cause of food insecurity as hostile activities of the market and political actors caused intermittent market shutdown and supply interruption.
Bishnu Raj Upreti was of the view that the armed conflict has reduced market opportunities, decreased production and productivity, reduced employment opportunities and enhanced food insecurity. Former chairman WAPDA Shams-ul-Mulk said that Pakistan is not a poor country but it has been made so adding that future cannot be predicted but can be prepared.
Dr Abid Suleri in his concluding remarks emphasised the importance of framing research based discourses to holistically understand the issues hindering peace and development in South Asian region. Rashed Titumir of Dhaka University said that we should look for indigenous options for having multiplier effects of on our development process. Indian scholar and professor, Avanish Kumar, lamenting persistent internal conflicts in South Asian region, said that peace is sustainable whereas conflict is not sustainable.
In the panel on water resource management, the importance of community based water management was emphasised by experts, and the issue of water quality, along side water availability must be addressed by policy makers. In the session on role of parliamentarians in peace and development, Shirala Mallick, Chairperson, Standing Committee of the Senate for Women Development urged that deep structural changes must be made to improve women's rights in Pakistan.
During the panel on regional trade, the experts agreed that increasing trade with India and the rest of the region would be highly beneficial for Pakistan. "Pakistani exports to South Asian countries represent a mere 17% of total exports and we are trying to increase it to 25% by the year 2012"." said Safdar Sohail, from the Federal Ministry of Trade.
In a panel on energy governance, experts emphasised the loss of industrial productivity, exports and economic growth as a result of electricity shortages in Pakistan urging policy makers to exploit the enormous potential of wind and solar energy in Pakistan.