Meeting 50 million jobs' target: PCJCCI urges government to fuel growth of manufacturing sector

Pakistan China Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCJCCI) has urged the government to encourage rapid growth of manufacturing sector for meeting target of 50 million jobs to youth of the country.

While speaking at the think-tank meeting here on Monday, PCJCCI President Zarak Khan said the economy needs to grow between three and eight percent annually to employ the youth with the investment rate of 30 percent. Currently, the investment rate is around 19 percent; he said and suggested to review the Chinese roadmap to achieve the economic prosperity on fast track in the country. He told that economic policies of China had attained the investment rate of 38 percent in record time, which can be a lesson for Pakistan as well.

Zarak Khan called for broader participation of the business community in Policy making process. The business community's confidence on economic policies of the present government is very low due to having an impression of "International Monetary Fund" (IMF) influence and domination on policy making process. He lamented the national budget, despite collecting proposals from the business community, is not made as per aspirations and requirement of the local economic needs.

PCJCCI Senior Vice President Moazzam Ghurki said that Pakistan could achieve similar success by introducing business-friendly policies, besides reducing cost of doing business to the lowest possible level. He said that Pakistan's economy was facing a multitude of problems, among which unemployment was the most alarming, as three million youth start seeking jobs every year and hardly one million succeed to get jobs. "The government should be looking at symptoms carefully before going for the cure," he said and urged the government to take the business community on abroad for resolving the issue amicably.

Referring to the services sector, Secretary General Salahuddin Hanif said that the services sector had been growing at a fast pace without a corresponding rise in the tax collection from this area. The development of the services sector is beneficial to the economy only if it pays fair taxes; otherwise the sector creates a few jobs and has little impact on the life of the common man, he said and suggested to introduce a corruption-free tax collection system for increasing the number of taxpayers in real terms.