November 18, 2006	Saturday	Shawwal 25, 1427

KARACHI, Nov 17: The approval of 24 investment projects by the Sindh chief minister is due shortly but their implementation is expected to be delayed owing to the scarcity of land in the metropolitan area and bureaucratic hurdles in provision of basic utilities.

A representative of Metro, a leading chain of stores of Germany, told Dawn on Friday that the group had applied to set up four supermarkets in Karachi but the Sindh Board of Revenue allotted 11.2 acres for only one store to be set up at University Road. “Our project requires a vast parking area for buyers who would visit the supermarket,” Aftab Ahmed said.

He said keeping in view security concerns the services of a security agency had been hired to provide protection not only to the visiting Metro officials but also to the site and the equipment.

The 24 investment projects, which after the CM’s nod would be referred to a scrutiny committee for detailed appraisal, include two Metro super stores, Turkish school, auto part plant, a cancer institute, a bath soap manufacturing factory (12 acres), a 50-mw wind power project (1,000 acres), a textile industrial estate, two bio-diesel plants (5,000 acres each), land measuring 500 acres each by the Export Promotion Bureau for setting up a carpet city, a women entrepreneurs city, a leather city, a furniture city and a warehousing complex.

The leading French chain of stores — Carrefour — has also submitted a proposal to the Sindh government for opening sales outlets which indicate that world’s leading chains are coming to Karachi with huge investments.

Earlier 34 investment projects, both foreign and domestic were approved by the chief minister, are in various stages of implementation. Of these land for 15 projects has already been allotted by the Sindh Revenue Board.

The projects include tourist hotel, steel making plant, pre-fabricated houses plant, synthetic carpet, textile chemicals plant, edible oil and poultry feed, warehousing, package industry, waste plastic recycling plant, industrial estate on Super Highway, modern hatchery etc.

Muslim Abbasi, head of the CM Investment Cell, giving details of some significant investment proposals said two overseas Pakistanis had applied for acquiring barren land to cultivate seeds for producing bio-diesel while a United States company had shown interest in setting up a coal-fired power plant with an investment of $2.5 billion.

He said that there was no dearth of investment proposals, but there was a need to improve the country’s image tarnished by some ugly incidents in the past. There were a number of instances where foreign companies made preliminary queries for establishing business in the province but did not submit proposals.

Under the new policy land for projects is provided at one fourth of the market price but the allotment is deemed to be cancelled if the said project is not started in two years.

The land is forbidden for sale. The land for commercial ventures is provided at half of the market price in the area.

The investment cell is working on a number of projects, which has great potential in attracting investment.

These include modernisation of fishing industry, value addition in agro based products, mechanised extraction of vast coal and granite reserves, construction of low cost housing and setting up SME clusters.