New and planned industrial cities would be set up in close collaboration with private sector and in line with the future needs of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), said Ali Agha, project manager New Economic City of the Punjab Urban Unit. He was addressing the FCCI (Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry) members here on Tuesday.
He said that earlier, he had visited Faisalabad for the pre-feasibility study of proposed economic city to be set up along motorway M-2 near Lillah. He said that Punjab Government is keen to incorporate the inputs of local industrial and business community to make it fully operational as soon as possible. He clarified that the site selection was not final; hence this job was entrusted to a foreign consultant. He said that during this study once again Lillah was on top of the list and it helped us in deciding the ranking of other proposed sites.
"I am also going to propose a CEPEC University and CPEC TV in addition to the water transportation facility through River Indus which will be 10 times cheap as compared to other modes of transportation. Ms Samita Khawer of Frost & Sullivan explained the salient features and aims & objectives of this study and said that this study is consist of three parts (i) whether the market has capacity to set up a new city (ii) selection of site for this city while the third is implementation. She said that in future the new viable and sustained cities could be developed by linking industry with urban development. She said that after Islamabad no new planned city was set up in Pakistan which has necessitated the development of a new city. In this connection she appreciated the efforts of the Punjab Government.
Nadeem Khurshid, Senior Urban Planning Specialist of the Urban Unit told that the objective to set up new city does not mean that Government was ignoring the existing cities. He said that government was fully concentrating on the existing cities and was also planning to develop new cities that could cater to our future needs. In this connection he said that he had contributed his role in Master Planning of Faisalabad under World Bank and during last two years Rs 40 billion investment has been made only in Faisalabad. He also termed that decision of the government to declare five industrial estates, including M-3 Industrial City as Special Economic Zones a big step towards rapid industrialization in the country.
He further said that government has also decided to set up combined water treatment plants in all industrial estates currently lacking this facility. Continuing, he said that they would organize road shows in China and Turkey in addition to holding awareness seminars in various parts of the county. He said that Chief Minister Punjab intends that local business community must be involved in the planning of new economic cities.
Earlier in his Address of welcome, Chaudhary Muhammad Nawaz President FCCI said that he is going to visit China along with the CM Punjab. The ultimate objective of this visit is to attract Foreign Direct Investment from China. "We are also expecting joint ventures with Chinese entrepreneurs and this visit will help us to finalise negotiations with other counter parts", he added. We should also take futuristic steps to develop new cities which will become necessary during next 5-10 years. He told that Chinese investors are also prepared to invest in Pakistan and we have to provide them trained and skilled manpower. He further told that FCCI has set up first ever CPEC Cell to provide CPEC related information to its members. He said that other people could also get this information from this Cell. He thanked the Urban Unit for holding this consultative seminar and hoped that this process will continue in future. Rao Sikandar Azam Khan, Ahmad Hassan and Imtiaz Ahmed took part in the Quaternion-Answer Session. Later, Zafar Ullah Salimi presented FCCI memento to Ali Agha while Shahid Mumtaz Bajwa offered vote of thanks.
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