Low cost electricity vital to improve living standard of masses

F.P. Report

KARACHI: Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum, and All Karachi Industrial Alliance, and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain has said that low electricity is very important to improve living standard of the masses.
Talking to businessmen on Monday, he said that affordable electricity boost industrial and agricultural production and make services cheap which helps masses improve their lives.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that small power houses should be preferred over big ones as practiced in the developed world which can help resolve the power sector issues.
Small power houses and focus on solar and wind power can help overcome losses worth trillions of rupees, he added.
The business leader said that according to a report of World Bank, twenty percent of electricity is wasted to theft and weak infrastructure while efficiency and transmission issues are resulting in losses worth $4.5 billion.
Fifty million people have no access to electricity while ninety million face load shedding resulting in monetary and social problems, he informed.
President PBIF said that country imports fossil fuel worth billions squeezing resources and adding to the pollution. Pakistan is producing 64 percent of electricity through imported fuel and it will increase as economy takes off, he added.
Efforts to improve transmission system and introduce renewable energy are half-hearted which should be given a boost while energy policy should be altered to make it according to the ground realities, he demanded.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that whole energy system should be revived and revisited so that masses could get affordable electricity which will also boost industrial and agricultural production and boost exports which are imperative for national development.