April 11, 2007	Wednesday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 22, 1428

ISLAMABAD, April 10: Pakistan has a wealth of experience in the privatisation field. Its privatisation transactions over the years have ranged from simple denationalisations — whereby nationalised entities were returned to their former owners — to highly complex sale transactions extending over several years.

This was stated by Zahid Hamid, the federal minister for Privatisation and Investment while inaugurating the first meeting of the high-level experts group (HLEG) of the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO) on Privatisation and Private Sector Development and second meeting of the ECO heads of privatisation administration here on Tuesday. The meeting decided to hold next ECO moot at Baku, Azerbaijan, in June this year.

The minister said that Pakistan was proud of its successful privatisation record, and would be only too willing to share its experience and expertise with member states in line with the principal objectives of ECO.

He said that the combined result of the privatisation and investment policies had been a dramatic ten-fold increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) in five years, from a mere $322 million in 2000-01 to $3.521 billion in 2005-06. With portfolio investment of $351 million, total foreign investment during 2005-06 was $3.87 billion.

He hoped that the experts group and heads of privatisation administration could prove to be an effective tool for sharing knowledge of policies and procedures and to benefit from each others experience, which would play a significant role in promoting such cooperation and realising the ECO’s objectives.

He further stated that the policies of privatisation, deregulation and liberalisation were the cornerstone of the highly successful economic reforms introduced by the present government. Due in large part to these economic reforms the economy of Pakistan continues to register rapid growth, averaging more than 7 per cent during the last four years.

Giving details Mr Zahid Hamid stated that from 1999 to 2006 the Privatisation Commission carried out 61 transactions for a total amount of Rs363 billion or $6 billion, which is 86 per cent of the total amount ($7 billion) realised from privatisation since the commission was established 15 years ago.

The government has also put in place a very liberal and attractive investment policy, which provides a level-playing field for domestic and foreign investors, he said adding that remittances of capital, profits, dividends and royalties, technical and franchise fees are freely allowed with attractive tax and tariff incentives.