Federal Minister for Water & Power Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao has said that the task force on electricity tariff in its final report has recommended major rationalisation in electricity tariff particularly for the benefit of domestic consumers.
The task force on Wednesday presented its report on tariff rationalisation to the Minister.
The Minister however said that the exact amount of reduction or rationalisation of tariff would be announced after consultation with and approval of the Cabinet. The report would be presented before the Cabinet next week after presentation to the inter-ministerial committee.
The minister expressed these views while addressing the task force on electricity tariff when it presented its final report on Wednesday.
The task force is headed by former federal Secretary, Water & Power, Mirza Hamid Hassan who presented the report.
The minister said that the report has recommended three types of tariff reduction.
Firstly, the short-term proposals, which would give immediate relief to the consumers.
Secondly, the long-term proposals, focusing on technical improvement and better distribution and control; thus reducing the losses.
Thirdly, the proposals for improvement of infrastructure that would definitely give relief to the consumers but are not exactly quantifiable.
However, the minister said, there was no doubt that the task force has done a wonderful job, but this would be a continuous ongoing process that would ensure further reduction of tariff, when and where possible.
He asked the task force to work on introduction of off-peak hours electricity utilisation incentives for the agriculture sector, as this would ensure optimum usage of electricity and reduction of costs. The minister said that this is very necessary to make the products internationally competitive.
Sherpao said that in addition to all these steps, the government was also focusing on the need of power generation through indigenous resources only.
He said that no new licences were being issued for power generation through furnace oil whereas the power projects utilising local coal, gas and hydel power are being encouraged as all Wapda thermal units have been converted to gas.
The minister said that Pakistan has the capacity to generate more than 40000 MW of hydel electricity "and we are working on tapping this immense source".
He said that work on about 10 hydroelectric power projects has started whose results would be obvious in 3-4 years while feasibility study is going on for other projects too. He said that only then hydel to thermal power ratio production would be tipped in favour of cheap hydel power.
The minister said that the government was working on electrification areas without power in the country.
"Electricity is a basic necessity of everyone and it is the aim of the government to electrify each and every village and town of the country, as poverty can not be alleviated without rural electrification", he added.
The minister said that model projects for generation of electricity from canal water would be constructed in all provinces very soon .
"If we want to generate cheap hydel electricity without constructing mega projects, we would have to be creative and innovative," the minister added.