United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Regional Coordinator for South Asia Regional Initiative for Energy (SARI-Energy), Robyn McGuckin said the US would continue supporting Pakistan in its endeavours to ensure energy security.
She was speaking at a dinner hosted by Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) at a local hotel on Wednesday evening. FPCCI President Tanvir Ahmad Sheikh and leading businessmen and industrialists were present on the occasion.
McGuckin said that with the rising prices of petroleum, the energy security had attained significance across the world especially in South Asia where the growth rate was very high. She said Pakistan was geo-strategically located between the region with largest energy reserves of the world and the countries with highest energy consumption like China.
McGuckin also referred to the factors like efficient energy market and the possibility of cross-border trade of energy (export or import of energy) that could ensure energy security in the region. Talking about the availability of hydrocarbon resources in Pakistan, she said this country had huge coal reserves that could be utilised for the generation of power.
Referring to June 27 symposium in Islamabad on Renewable Energy, she said that wind and solar maps of Pakistan's and Afghanistan's renewable energy sources presented there were prepared with the support of USAID's SARI/Energy.
McGuckin said the wind and solar maps provided the people and governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan a quantified and qualified assessment of wind and solar energy resources of their respective countries. The SARI/Energy had also prepared wind and solar energy maps for Sri Lanka and the Maldives, she added.
Earlier, in his address of welcome, FPCCI President Tanvir Ahmad Sheikh said that US could assist Pakistan to address the economic challenges through shifting its support from conventional aid to market access, investment, technology transfer, education and training, scientific research and infrastructure development.
"We realise that time has come for re-appraisal of the existing US strategy to Pakistan to have more widened and meaningful cooperation in trade and investment," he said.
Tanvir A. Sheikh said that Pakistan would prefer to have greater access to the US market compared to increased aid allocation. He said the USAID programme could help Pakistan in the sectors like exploration of minerals and natural resources, construction of dams and electricity generation projects. Former FPCCI president Tariq Sayeed and Rehmatullah Javed also spoke on the occasion.
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