ISLAMABAD: Planning Minister Khusro Bakhtyar talked about financing intra-regional connectivity and government policies at the Peace and Development Conference in Islamabad.

Federal Minister Bakhtyar explained that with the onset of the ‘fourth Industrial Revolution,’ the landscape of global economic world functions will change.

 

“The governments have to come up with a policy for financing intra-regional connectivity corridors whether its energy or transport,” he said.

The retail markets are being taken over by e-commerce. The digital economy is taking a larger share. The developed economies are heavily investing in their retail and distribution.

“The requisite momentum for South Asia, Central Asia, and Middle East would need the economic scales of East Asia to be in a partnership with it,” he went on.

The minister strongly urged Dialogue Partners to reflect on this suggestion.

He further explained,

“While we talk of long-term energy and transport corridors, we should also look at potential of private sector for joint ventures, for tapping each other’s competitive advantages and for that very reason under China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the future course of that is, in terms of our policy, most of the initiatives will be under private sector business to business sectors.”

For that purpose, a China-Pakistan business forum has been made led by capitols of industry from both sides, he said.

To be ‘transformational’ is important, the Federal Minister said. It needs to be all-inclusive which is why when the government came in, their counterparts from China decided under the CPEC framework, a third company participation working group joined led by both the foreign ministries to identify projects where participation from other countries. That is another focus area the Federal Minister and his team are working on under the CPEC structure.

“We need to find diagnostic studies of these specific strengths and demands of each economy plus gaps in policy in terms of tax policy, tariff policy, visa regimes, and so on. For each sector, a genuine policy and a diagnostic policy is needed.”

He concluded by suggesting studies among these countries of the region in terms of harmonization of their policies be carried out as well a search for finding win-win partnerships in different sectors.