The Central Development Working Party has prioritized health sector by approving five health projects worth Rs 22.7 billion. The meeting was chaired by Minister for Planning, Development and Reform Professor Ahsan Iqbal and was attended by senior officers of the provincial governments and ministries concerned.
Overall, the CDWP approved seven projects worth Rs 36 billion, including four projects costing Rs 30 billion, which were referred to the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC). In health sector CDWP referred Sindh Immunization Support Programme (SISP) worth Rs 8 billion, Expanded Programme on Immunization Khyber Pukhtunkhwa worth Rs 6.6 billion with FEC Rs 1.4 billion, Expanded Programme on Immunization Balochistan worth Rs 7.3 billion with FEC Rs 2.8 billion to ECNEC.
All the three immunization projects, Sindh, KPK and Balochistan aim to prevent children from nine diseases including childhood tuberculosis, poliomyelitis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, hepatitis B, haemophilus influenza, measles and pneumonia. The meeting approved establishment of unit for shredding, sterilization and disposal of medical waste of Pakistan Institute of Medical Science (PIMS) Islamabad with cost of Rs 199 million in principal and directed to rationalize the scope of the project.
It has also approved establishment of children hospital at Bhawalpur (Phase1) of worth Rs 519 million. Under phase 1 of this project, 235 bedded hospitals will be established which will help reduce the current load of children per bed in the Bahwalpur division.
The CDWP approved five MGD reverse Osmosis sea water plant for Gwadar city worth Rs 5071 million. The project aims to meet the future demand of 14.0 MGD by 2020. It also approved 7th STG (secondary transmission and grid stations) project worth Rs 8572 million with FEC Rs 1362 million. The project aims to provide adequate facilities for reliable and stable supply of electrical power to meet with the growing demand of domestic, commercial industrial and agricultural customers of GEPCO.
The CDWP also approved three position papers including extension of right bank outfall drain from Sehwan to sea (RBOD-2) with cost of Rs 61.9 billion, Balochistan effluent disposal into RBOD worth Rs 10.8 billion and lower Indus right bank irrigation and drainage project (LIRBP) stage-1 worth Rs 17.5 billion.-PR