ISLAMABAD: The Economic Coordination Committee of the Cabinet (ECC) on Monday considered and approved the provision of 50,000 Metric Tons of wheat costing Rs.2.007 Billion to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) for the temporarily displaced people of FATA and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The ECC met here under the chair of Federal Minister for Finance senator Ishaq Dar here at the Prime Minister’s office this afternoon. The approved quantity will be distributed to the target population from December 2016 to June 2017.
It is worth mentioning that the quantity is the second such approval after the provision of 124,000 metric tons of wheat costing Rs. 4.977 billion to the displaced population; the stocks from the earlier grant will be exhausted in November as reported by the World Food Programme. In view of the growing needs of the country for energy, ECC considered and approved the proposal sent by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources, for the setting up of the LPG Air Mix Plants at Murree (Kurbagla, Dewal, Company Bagh and Tret), Awaran and Bella at an estimated cost of Rs. 1353.29 million to be funded by the respective Gas Utility Companies (SSGCL and SNGPL) through their own resources. For the housing colonies, the private sector was free to establish their own LPG Air Mix plants subject to the fulfillment of all codal formalities such as OGRA licensing, explosive licenses etc. It was also decided that in addition to the above mentioned plants 30 new Air mix plants each on SSGCL and SNGPL system would be constructed in the areas of AJK, Chitral, Gilgit Baltistan and backward areas of Balochistan as the development of these areas is the first priority of the government. The setting up of the LPG Air Mix Plants would save these areas from rapid deforestation in these areas. The ECC also approved and ordered the notification of the Price Negotiation Committee (PNC) for the LNG supplies from Malaysia, Russia, France, Italy, Oman and Azerbaijan in the wake of the growing demand of energy in the country.
The ECC also decided that the PNC would engage with all the energy supplying companies in the process to finalise the best deal for the country. The ECC also approved the proposal by the Ministry of Water and Power for utilisation of power generated through captive power plants as a short term measure in order to optimize use of available generation in the coming summers of 2017 and 2018. The measure taken by the Ministry would add around 300 to 600MW to the National grid on the condition that plants having a capacity of 3 MW or above on gas, furnace oil, coal, gas and other fuels/sources will be offered energy purchase under this policy.
