A meeting of Ecnec, chaired by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, has approved 14 new development projects costing Rs 69 billion and nine revised schemes involving an expenditure of Rs 47.5 billion in agriculture, energy, science and technology, water, transport environment, higher education and culture sectors.
The Prime Minister has informed the Ecnec meeting that a record number of uplift schemes, with special emphasis on energy sector, have been approved during the last three years, a booklet on which is also being published for distribution.
He argued that the frequency of Ecnec meetings, held over the past three years, testified to the government's resolve to cut down delays in approval of the uplift projects, which he claimed had resulted in speedier development activities in the country.
At a press briefing later, the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Dr Akram Shaikh informed media representatives that 45 projects were approved at the last Ecnec session, while the number of uplift schemes approved in just two months ie September and October stood at 68.
He disclosed that as many as 632 projects worth Rs 2.36 trillion had been approved in the last eight years, including 394 in infrastructure sector and 200 in social and other sectors. Meanwhile, in a crucial move the government is planning to enhance nuclear energy's share in the overall energy mix by increasing production of nuclear energy to 8,800 megawatts.
In this connection, Ecnec has approved two projects, ie Chemical Processing Plant (CPP) and Nuclear Fuel Enrichment Plant (NFEP). Other uplift schemes approved in the energy sector include oil and gas exploration in Balochistan and the Chashma hydropower project.
Ecnec has also approved a social sector uplift project which aims at providing higher education opportunities to students of backward regions like Balochistan and Fata, with the offer of 2,000 scholarships at school, college and university levels.
Sixty percent of the scholarships will be for Balochistan and 40 percent will be for Fata. In addition, 10 new engineering universities, with one at Islamabad, will also be set up in the country. As the Prime Minister declared at the Ecnec meeting, the present government has indeed approved a record number of uplift schemes, particularly in the infrastructure sector.
Approval of as many as 68 mega projects in just two months would constitute a record of sorts. However, what is more important is their timely execution, in which we have woefully lagged behind. In August this year the Central Development Working Party (CDWP) had approved 38 projects worth Rs 72.1 billion, with a foreign exchange component of Rs 17.1 billion. (Twenty-one of these projects had to be referred to Ecnec for approval, as the cost of each was more than Rs 500 million).
Again, in May this year CDWP had approved 39 projects, including 26 in the infrastructure sector, valued at Rs 8.5 billion, six in social sector at a cost of Rs 1.4 billion, and seven in science and technology and other sectors, costing Rs 1.8 billion.
These are some of the recent projects that have been approved by the government. Incidentally, a related feature of project execution in the country has been the hefty cost overruns sustained from time to time, largely because of delayed implementation.
For instance, in August last year, the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission had announced blanket cost overruns of eight projects amounting to Rs 21 billion. A major cause of delayed execution of projects in the country is said to have been late release of funds.
Timely release of funds is of critical importance for scheduled and smooth completion of projects. Yet another factor that has often vitiated project execution has been the lack of uniform pace of implementation, with the fag end of the year often witnessing breakneck speed, which has invariably resulted in substandard construction.
The collapse of Karachi Port berths and that of the newly constructed Northern Bypass in Karachi are the recent instances of defective project execution. The fact is that the current dispensation in the country, like most of its predecessors, has been rather long on planning, but woefully short on timely implementation, with the result that projects have often sustained quality control lapses.
As the bureaucracy is the implementation arm of the government, it needs to be suitably activated to ensure timely and high quality work on projects, particularly in the infrastructure sector, with minimum waste of time and national resources. As there has hardly ever been a word on the status of execution of projects, the booklet being compiled on the government's three years' performance is a step in the right direction.