March 23, 2006	Thursday	Safar 22, 1427

ISLAMABAD, March 22: Federal Minister for Industries, Production and Special Initiatives Jahangir Khan Tareen said on Wednesday that the government was establishing national industrial parks (NIPs)in the country to increase the industrial base generating employment and raising the sector’s share in GDP.

According to a statement, he was speaking at a meeting held to review progress on rehabilitation of industrial estates in Karachi and opening of NIPs’ regional offices.

The meeting was attended by Secretary Industries, Kamran Rasool, CEO Engineering Development Board (EDB), Imtiaz Rastgar, Chief Operating Officer (COO) National Industrial Parks Company (NIPs) and officials from Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation (PIDC).

The project of setting up common effluent treatment plants CETP) also came under discussion.

The NIPs chief in his presentation informed the minister that the NIPs was working on setting up two industrial parks in Karachi, namely Korangi Creek Industrial Park (KCIP) and Downstream Industrial Estate (DIE), one each in Bannu and Jallozai.

The Minister was also given detailed information about the rehabilitation of industrial estates in Karachi. All the issues relating to the rehabilitation were discussed in detail and the minister expressed his desire to remove all bottlenecks in the process of rehabilitation.

The minister assured the NIPs officials that the government would extend all possible assistance to make the company a vibrant organization and issues relating to land and power supply would be settled as early as possible.

He explained that the area which included Gujranwala, Gujrat and Wazirabad, was the centre of small and medium enterprizes and this project of industrial parks would go for further development of industry in this area.

The minister also asked NIPs to establish industrial parks in Balochistan on a priority basis.

The PIDC officials briefed the minister about common effluent treatment plants (CETP) project. The project included setting up 4 CETPs in Karachi.