September 01, 2008	Monday	Sha'aban 29, 1429

ISLAMABAD, Aug 31: President Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) Mohammad Ijaz Abbasi has called for reverting the clock back by one hour from Monday.

He said if the government continued to stick by its decision of reverting the clock on November 1, it would create problems for people in Ramazan.

“The objective of energy saving cannot be effectively achieved by advancing the clock by one hour”, he said at a meeting held here on Sunday.

The chamber president said the recent phenomenon of prolonged loadshedding in the country was inflicting losses to the tune of billions of rupees to the business community and urged the government to take urgent measures to cope with the situation to save the economic activities from further slowdown.

He said the frequent and unannounced power outage was not only causing production loss but also damaging costly industrial plants and equipments. The worst-affected are small and medium size industrial units which cannot afford self-generation and have to depend on power utilities, he maintained.

Mr Abbasi said production in some areas of the country like Karachi had gone down by 45 to 50 per cent owing to frequent and prolonged power outages, while, he added, 50 per cent of industry had gone out of production in some industrial estates in that city.

Under these circumstances, he said, it was becoming difficult to run the business and industry as power supply is a basic input for manufacturing activities and that without availability of consistent and steady power supply, no country can develop its economy.

He said the concerned authorities should give top priority to this issue to steer the country out of this crisis and put it on the path of progress and prosperity.

The chamber president said the country’s economy was facing many challenges. The foreign exchange reserves have fallen to $9.38 billion from a record high of $16.5 billion in October last year but have since then been depleting by high payments for oil imports, he said, adding that foreign investors were also withdrawing money because of the country’s uncertain situation.

He said the country’s capital market witnessed continuous outflow of the foreign investment as, he added, an exodus of $12.771 million of foreign portfolio investment was registered during the week ended on Friday.