Media Coverage

Donation to PM’s Fund for Affectees of Earthquake in Balochistan
APP Islamabad
Tuesday, 10th Dec 2013
Islamabad

Minister for Planing and Development, Professor Ahsan Iqbal said on Tuesday that due to transparent fiscal policies and zero tolerance for malpractices no corruption case was reported during the six months of the present government. He was addressing the 16th Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) Conference here at a local hotel today. The minister said that government was also determined to eradicate the menace of corruption from the country for sustainable development and socio-economic uplift of the country. He said that government, under its next five year development plan and vision-2025 introduced seven points agenda to turn around the national economy and put it on fast track growth by harnessing the available resources.

The government, he said was focusing on energy security, human social capital, creating indigenous resources besides modernizing infrastructure for economic development of the country.     
Ahsan Iqbal said that special attention was paid to small and medium enterprises as it works as engine of growth adding that transaction from low quality to high quality products and further improving the governance was the main thrust.
He further said that to strengthen the industrial sector of the country and to enhance quality as well as productivity of the sector, government has decided to celebrate 2014 as a year of “Quality and Productivity”.
The minister informed that government was determined to ensure rule of law in the country adding that due to supremacy of law all the agencies are made answerable before the court of law.
Besides, he said that all political forces in the country were also getting mature and issues like provincial autonomy was addressed with complete consensus and the provinces were given more constitutional and financial rights.
The minister said that with trade globalization in the world, the regionalization was also emerging and trade among the regional countries were rapidly growing.
Professor Iqbal said that friendly bilateral relation between India and Pakistan are vital to exploit the true trade potential of South Asian region for benefiting the million of people.
During last 10 years, Pakistan has taken several steps to improve bilateral relation with india but unfortunately India has not responded positively and had adopted Pakistan bashing policies in its recent general elections, he added.
Ahsan Iqbal stressed the need for starting sports and cultural activities besides enhancing people to people contacts for normalizing the environment to restore peace process between the two countries.
The minister also appreciated SDPI for its efforts in policy formulation by engaging academia, civil society and media for sustainable development of the country.
He expressed the hop that the event will come up some concrete recommendations on different issues and challenges being faced by the region in fighting poverty, hunger, illiteracy, health and climate changes.