20 civic, development projects completed in Karachi: CS

Sindh Chief Secretary Syed Mumtaz Ali Shah has said that 20 out of 40 civic and development projects launched in Karachi by the Sindh government in the current financial year have been completed.

He stated this during his meeting with a 33-member delegation of the Advanced Diplomat Course participants on Wednesday. The delegation comprised under-training diplomatic officials from Afghanistan, South Africa, Iraq, Bahrain, Morocco, Nepal, Palestine, Sudan, Ukraine, Yemen, Zambia, Maldives, and Sri Lanka.

Shah said the projects initiated by the provincial government involved road infrastructure, storm water drainage, bridges, and underpasses, adding that the government had given emphasis on development projects. He said that Rs284 billion had been allocated by the government for the development projects in the province during the current financial year.

He said that assistance from the World Bank was being sought to upgrade the functioning of the municipal institutions in the city, including the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board and Sindh Building Control Authority.

The chief secretary said that work had been started on several components of the bus rapid transit System to build a mass transit system in the city. The province was rich in natural resources and it carried massive opportunities to do investment.

He said the Thar coal reserves had the capability to generate 100,000 megawatts of electricity for the next 300 years. He said that the mode of public-private partnership had been followed to do the first project to generate electricity on the basis of Thar coal as the project was producing 660 MWs of electricity which was being supplied to the national grid.

He said the wind corridor had the capacity to generate 50,000 MWs renewable electricity, and a new special economic zone was being constructed in Dhabeji under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.