Sindh declines to set up warehouse for relief goods

Sindh government has declined to establish a Regional Centralised Warehouse (RCW) for relief goods, lying in Karachi and the consignment coming from abroad in response to a request from the Federal Relief Commission (FRC) for setting up such facility.
FRC asked the provincial government to set up this warehouse a couple of days back to store the relief goods apart from edible items, reliable sources disclosed to Business Recorder on Friday.
According to sources, FRC made the request on the pretext that apart from edible items, the other things are not required in urgency in the earthquake-hit areas, therefore, these should be stored in Sindh for future needs or be used in future in case of any eventuality in the province.
Sources revealed that a meeting of high officials of the provincial government took the decision in a meeting on Friday and asked the FRC to make some other arrangement for this purpose as the provincial government has not the required place or the expertise to do this task.
"The meeting asked FRC to hire the services of any private company or federal government department to do this task," sources added. The FRC had requested, sources pointed out, for storage of 15,000 tents and 500,000 blankets and some other items, as these are not needed in the quake-stricken areas at the moment because of outgoing winter season in these areas.
A huge collection of relief goods has accumulated at COD because of inefficiency of the Pakistan Railways to provide the required logistic services for transportation of these to the needy people in earthquake-ravaged areas. Sources said that the FRC had made the request on the grounds that the stock lying.
At the COD might be ruined due to mouse bite, therefore, it felt for having some special storage facility to save this huge stock of tents and blankets.
While mentioning that a major part of relief goods, donated by different countries, has arrived in the country, sources said that some consignments are still on way to Pakistan, which once arrived, would further add to this piled-up stock at the COD.
Sources said that the provincial departments, engaged in relief activities, had to face a great difficulty in managing the task because of the overwhelming response of people of Sindh, particularly Karachi, to help their brethren in this hour of need.