Govt moves to take over Rs800bn power sector circular debt.

Byline: Khaleeq Kiani

ISLAMABAD -- The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet on Wednesday expressed concerns over slow procurement of wheat by the public sector and set in motion shifting of over Rs800 billion power sector circular debt to public debt to honour commitments with the international lending agencies.

The meeting, presided by Adviser to PM on Finance and Revenue Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh also approved a total of five supplementary grants worth Rs2.492bn. Major part of these grants pertained to Rs2.1bn funding to Inter Services Intelligence including Rs1.665bn for upgradation of Special Telecom Monitoring Project and a Rs500 million for construction of a Special Education School at the Defence Complex Islamabad.

The ECC was also informed that wheat production was feared to fall nine per cent below of the target set for this year and total production was now estimated at about 25m tonnes. Some participants expressed concerns that procurement by public sector was not up to the mark. Relevant officials told the meeting that Sindh Government appeared to be behind target and so was the case with Balochistan while harvesting in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was usually behind rest of the provinces for climatic reasons.

ECC directs food ministry to achieve wheat procurement target

An official statement said the ECC asked the Ministry of National Food Security and Research (MNFSR) to closely monitor the wheat procurement process and actively engage with food departments and the Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Services Corporation (Passco) to ensure wheat procurement target of 8.25m tonnes is achieved by the public sector this year.

The meeting also directed the food ministry to submit a detailed report in the next two to three weeks on the progress of wheat procurement by Passco and provincial food departments and overall wheat production in the country with the help of reliable data and figures to have a clearer picture for better planning in future.

The ECC also called for exploring possibilities to allow more time to flour mills to procure wheat from the market, allowing inter-provincial movement and preventing smuggling of wheat outside the country. One of the members told the meeting that restriction on movement of wheat in the country was a violation of the Constitution but there was a need to keep a close watch to curb wheat smuggling.

It was also noted that there was no need at all for wheat imports as 500,000-600,000 tonnes...

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