Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to spend Rs 236 million on development of tobacco producing areas

Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Ameer Haidar Khan Hoti said that utilisation of resources of Tobacco Development Cess on development of tobacco producing areas has yielded positive results and the process will be continued. He expressed this while chairing a high level meeting here at his office regarding utilisation of tobacco development cess.
Participants of the meeting were provincial minister Arbab Ayub Jan MPAs Pervez Khan, Sikandar Irfan, Ahmad Khan Bahader, Qaisar Wali Khan and Syed Rahim, administrative secretaries of finance, P&D, local government and excise, special secretary to chief minister Waqar Ul Hasan.
The chief minister said that under the policy total amount of Rs 236.508 million would be spent on development schemes in tobacco production areas in consultation with people representatives. Maintaining last year formula of distribution of tobacco revenue has been agreed during the meeting.
Under the formula Rs 236.508 million will be distributed among Sawabi, Mardan, Charsadda, Buneer, Nowshehra, Malaknd and Mansehra on production basis. It merits a mention here there was no mechanism or procedure regarding utilisation of tobacco cess in the past consequently these resources were utilised for other parts of the province in spite of production areas which was injustice.
He said the present democratic government has ensured utilisation of these resources for the welfare and development of concerned areas that yielded positive results. Meanwhile, the chief minister chaired another meeting. Detailed briefing on matters pertaining to progress on rehabilitation of last year flood devastated government infra structure, situation regarding resources and confronting problems was presented during the meeting.
Damages in different sectors, including health, education, communication, irrigation and clean drinking water were reviewed while concerned authorities provided details regarding rehabilitation and reconstruction of damaged infra structure across the province.
The chief minister expressed satisfaction over early rehabilitation of damaged infrastructure and congratulated officers of the concerned departments. He issued directives for solving problems confronting concerned departments. Participants of the meeting were ACS Atta Ullah Khan, secretaries P&D, finance, C&W, irrigation, Public Health Engineering, Elementary and Secondary Education, Higher Education, health, food, DG Flood C&W, Director Planning PHE and other concerned authorities.