KARACHI: Sindh Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Saturday unveiled a total development spending of Rs213.6 billion for 2015-16, with a major thrust on energy, infrastructure besides expenditure to address law and order challenges in the province.

The break-up includes the provincial annual development programme (ADP) of Rs162bn, development financing through foreign project assistance (FPA) of Rs26.9bn, federal Public Sector Development Plan (PSDP) of Rs9.6bn and a provision of Rs15bn through viability gap fund (VGF) arranged under public-private partnership.

The resource constraints have impacted the ADP allocations during the outgoing fiscal year (2014-15) which was Rs215.3bn.

However, it goes to the credit of provincial planners who attempted to strike a balance in allocating funds and ensuring desired development targets in different sectors of the provincial economy.

Unfolding the budget 2015-16 on the floor of the Sindh Assembly, the finance minister said that the provincial government has earmarked Rs16.5bn in ADP for the energy sector which “is reflective of government’s commitment to its coal, wind and other energy projects”.

He added that for realising the vision of generating 10,000MW from Thar coal by 2020, the Sindh is creating conducive environment for foreign direct investment (FDI) through the development of both physical and institutional infrastructure.

A sizable amount of Rs12bn has been allocated for irrigation development with the objective to achieve both long-term and short-term development plans such as rehabilitation of barrages, protection and capacity enhancement of irrigation and drainage networks.

The allocation has been divided into Rs8.964bn for ongoing schemes and Rs3.035bn for new ones. Two new special projects are also being planned —the lining of the Rohri canal at a cost of Rs9.14bn, and the lining of Jamrao canal at Rs9.535bn.

The Sindh government is also executing 15 development programmes funded by the federal government at an estimated cost of Rs102.476bn. In addition to provincial ADP of Rs12bn for the irrigation department, foreign project assistance of Rs9.457bn will be available for rehabilitation and modernisation of Guddu Barrage, Sindh water sector improvement project and procurement of machinery for rehabilitation of infrastructure.

He said current revenue expenditure of the agriculture department has been increased by 5.79pc to Rs5.482bn as against Rs5.182bn in the outgoing fiscal year. The ADP for next financial year is pitched at Rs4.5bn, out of which Rs3.976bn is for ongoing schemes and Rs0.532bn for new ones.

Besides provincial ADP, Rs4.24bn has been allocated for foreign-funded projects of the agriculture department which are Sindh Agriculture Growth Project and Sindh Irrigated Agriculture Productivity Enhancement project.

The provincial government has allocated Rs8.54bn for the development and up-gradation of road network. The government has set its target to complete 314 schemes with a total length of 2,760kms in FY16 as against 40 schemes in the current financial year.

In addition to provincial ADP, Rs1.211bn has been allocated for foreign-funded development projects of roads sector, including construction of Nawabshah-Sanghar road (Rs1bn with Chinese loan) and Japanese Assisted Rural Roads Construction Project Rs211.5 million.

In order to meet ever-growing transportation needs of Karachi, the provincial government has chalked out four rapid bus transit projects, including BRT Yellow Line project having an estimated cost of Rs13bn. The 26km-long route would facilitate 150,000 commuters per day.

Similarly, the BRT Orange Line project is being carried out under the ADP at a cost of Rs2.36m. The BRT Green Line project is to be funded by the federal government while BRT Red Line project will be implemented through ADP with an estimated cost of Rs15bn, for which Rs2bn has been allocated in FY16.

From the provincial ADP, Rs18.76bn has been allocated in the next year for local government, rural development and public health engineering department. A sum of Rs12bn has been allocated to health, including Rs10.063bn for ongoing schemes and Rs2.937bn for new schemes. This is almost 35 per cent higher than the released amount of current fiscal year.

The provincial government in budget 2015-16 has accorded premier precedence to the law and order issues of the province for which it has allocated Rs65.33bn.

Giving details, the minister said that Rs61.82bn has been allocated for the Sindh police, Rs2.43bn for the Rangers, Rs1.05bn for the Frontier Constabulary and Rs1.52bn for training and research.

Published in Dawn, June 14th, 2015

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