ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly Standing Committee on Industries and Production, Monday, directed the Ministry of Industries and other relevant departments to locally ensure the availability of urea fertiliser as the country was facing a shortage of around 700,000 tons and the import cost of which will be $300 million.
The committee meeting which was held here under the chairmanship of Syed Ghulam Mustafa Shah to discuss and review matters pertaining to the urea supply/demand situation for the year 2023, and the privatisation of Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) and Heavy Electrical Complex (HEC), was informed by the officials of the Ministry of Industries and Production that the total urea requirement for the year will be around 6.3 million tons, of which, 5.6 million tons will be locally available.
The committee members directed all the concerned ministries and departments considering the country’s financial crunch to locally ensure urea availability by arranging natural gas supplies to all the fertiliser plants.
The committee recommended that the details of assets of the employees of the PSM retired and also in the service be provided to the committee. The committee further recommended that the Federal Investigation Authority (FIA) should also brief the committee regarding a theft inquiry of the PSM, in the next meeting. The ministry officials clarified that the total theft volume was not Rs10 billion but only Rs4.7 million and it was wrongly reported.
The committee was informed that in response to “Automotive Development Policy 2016-21” many car manufacturers showed interest, so far, eight car manufacturing plants have been installed in the country. Advance booking payment restricted to 20 percent for cars, LCVs, SUVs, by the ministry, according the policy. The committee was informed that the privatisation process of the PSM has reached an advance stage and the process of privatisation of the HEC is near completion. The shares purchased agreement was signed on April 1, 2022, against the purchase price of Rs1.4 billion. The officials said that the PSM privatisation was facing problems owing to Rs220 billion payables to various clients, now the ministry and the PSM management have resolved the administrative and legal issues as a result homework for the privatisation is almost completed.
The officials said that the decision to privatise the steel mills was taken in 2019 after which four international companies expressed interest in acquiring it, of which, two leading Chinese companies have also visited the steel mills.
However, there were huge liabilities problems in the steel mills, of which the liability with the Sui Southern Gas Company has been settled. The officials said that Steel Mills was divided into two companies, the first will remain under the name of Steel Mills, while the second company will be Steel Corporation, which has also been registered.
The meeting was attended by Rana Muhammad Ishaq Khan, Syed Imran Ahmad Shah, Nasir Khan Musa Zai, Usama Qadri, Nawab Sher, Kiran Imran Dar, and Maulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023