ISLAMABAD, Dec 27: The annual general meeting and conference of Pakistan Society of Development Economists (PIDE) on Tuesday (today) will focus on fiscal decentralisation following the passage of the 18th amendment and the 7th National Finance Commission award.

Deputy Chairman Planning Commission Nadeem ul Haque will inaugurate the three-day conference on “Fiscal Decentralisation: Empowering the Provinces, Strengthening the Federation”.

Minister of State for Finance and Economic Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar, Chairman Federal Board of Revenue Salman Siddique and renowned economists, including Hafiz A Pasha, Qaiser Bangali, Dr Ashfaque Hasan Khan, will speak during the technical sessions of the conference.

PIDE hopes the conference will be instrumental in encouraging research and dialogue on fiscal decentralisation and its implications for the country’s economic development.

The sub-themes of the conference include macro-economic management and economic planning, taxation in a decentralised setup, financing mega-projects, managing social sectors, and learning from international experience and the 7th NFC award.

With the passage of the 18th amendment, Pakistan has taken a major step towards fiscal decentralisation.

While the amendment has conferred substantial economic authority upon the provinces, the 7th NFC award has allowed transfer of more funds from the federation to provinces.

The provinces will now have the authority over a range of functions from the provision of health and educational facilities to the development of physical infrastructure and from electricity generation and distribution to the management of the environment.

A fundamental shift in the division of powers between the provinces and the centre is emerging with far reaching implications for the country’s long term development and growth prospects.

Whereas fiscal decentralisation is expected to provide effective mechanisms for achieving various development goals, its success will depend on striking a right balance of power between provinces and the federation.

The 18th amendment allows the provinces to develop physical infrastructure, including mega-projects as power generation and distribution.

Social sectors like health and education are now in the sole domain of provinces.

The PIDE conference will discuss how can the provinces build their capacities and generate resources for effective public service delivery in social sectors. Fiscal decentralisation has been in vogue in a number of countries since long and Pakistan can learn from their experiences.