'Corona tiger force' to deliver food: PM

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday said that the federal and the provincial governments had decided in the National Coordination Committee (NCC) to exempt the goods transport from the lockdown to ensure supply of essential commodities.
Talking to a television anchorperson after a National Coordination Committee (NCC) meeting, he stated coronavirus did not spread in Pakistan as it did in Italy and other countries but there was no guarantee that the situation would remain the same after two weeks.
"So our effort is to make preparations to fight off spike of corona," he said, adding that the government had learned from China how they provided food to the Wuhan population after lockdown.
The prime minister said that, "we have decided to set up special youth force 'corona tiger force' of young people to provide food to the people in areas where virus cases were reported.
He said that registration for the coronavirus force would start from March 31 at Youth Citizen Portal.
Khan added that the Prime Minister's Fund would also be announced by next week to provide monetary benefit to the unemployed daily wagers.
There is a huge population of labourers in the country, he added.
The prime minister said as Pakistan was one of the countries where people had been giving huge amount in charity therefore, the government had decided to register and guide them to work in a designated area with the objective to avoid duplication.
The prime minister said that Pakistan's exports would be affected consequent to the trade affected by the virus across the world.
There is also fear that remittances would also decline and consequently repercussions of decline in exports and remittances would be negative on country's foreign exchange reserves. "We are planning to open an account at the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and would appeal to the overseas Pakistani to deposit dollars in the account, so as to support the country's foreign exchange reserves," he said.
The prime minister said after the joint decision in the NCC with regard to restoration of goods transport, now there would be no restriction of movement of transport from one province to the other.
Moreover, the meeting had also decided that essential food industry would continue its operations, and the mechanism to this effect was being finalised to ensure that supply side was not affected without any danger of spread of coronavirus, he said.
"This would be a difficult balance because on the one hand the government does not want corona to spread, while on the other hand, it wants that the supply chain is not affected from the lockdown," he added.
Minister for National food, Security and Research Khusru Bukhtiar said that there was sufficient wheat in the country to meet the need of the people till the arrival of new crop, adding that shortage of flour was noted due to suspension of goods transport after the lockdown and piling up of stock by the people.
There is one million tons of wheat with the public sector and the gap would be bridged in the next couple of days as supply chain would be restored after the restoration of goods transport, he added.
Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Health Dr Zafar Mirza promised that by April 5 health workers would be provided necessary equipment required for coronavirus and stated that training would also be provided to 5,000 paramedical staff to manage critical cases.
Planning minister Asad Umar said that the government would prepare a list of essential commodities and a mechanism would be devised to make operational those industries preparing those goods, while putting in place measures against the spread of coronavirus.