KARACHI: The World Bank and the Sindh government agreed on Monday to launch a $145 million Sindh Covid-19 Response Programme and a Locust Control Programme in the province.

This decision was taken in a meeting between Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah and World Bank country director Patchamuthu Illangovan through video link. The chief minister took part in the meeting from the CM House and the WB director with his team from his Islamabad office.

The chief minister was assisted by Energy Minister Imtiaz Sheikh, CM’s coordinator Haris Gazdar, chairman of P&D Mohammad Waseem, energy secretary Musadiq Khan, finance secretary Hassan Naqvi and investment secretary Najam Shah.

At the outset of the meeting, the CM said his government with technical and financial support of the World Bank wanted to launch a Covid-19 impact programme.

He said that resource mobilisation through diversion of funds/restructuring, re-purposing and realigning World Bank portfolio would be required for the purpose.

He said specific monitoring system was being developed in Karachi. “But I want a high impact Covid-19 monitoring system to be developed for the entire province,” he suggested to the WB.

Murad says Sindh is far ahead of other provinces in coronavirus testing

According to Mr Shah his government had planned to disinfect all the public places, bus stands/stops, offices, proper cleaning of roads and public areas, cleaning of storm-water drains, establishment of two garbage transfer stations and two landfill sites in the city.

The WB chief approved the proposal and said the provincial government could use funds to the tune of $135m from its different projects by diverting the amount until the project was formally approved at the forums concerned.

Support to SMEs

Murad Ali Shah said that the coronavirus crisis had badly affected economic activities in the province. “The small and medium enterprises have faced considerable losses, therefore, the provincial government has worked out a plan to extend small loans and financial support to daily wagers,” he said.

The WB assured the chief minister that they would support the Sindh government to revive economic activities in the province and rehabilitate the daily wagers through a separate programme and it would be made part of the Covid-19 response programme.

Locus control project

The chief minister said that after Covid-19 another threat of locust attacks on the standing crops had emerged. “Locust swarms have already damaged one-third of the cropping area of the province,” he said.

He said that his government wanted the WB to extend its technical and financial support to the provincial government so that crops and desert areas could be sprayed at the earliest, otherwise locust swarm attacks would destroy the crops and thereby food security issues would develop in the province.

The WB approved $10m for the Locus Control Programme and advised Sindh to divert the funds from Sindh Agriculture Growth Project and start locust control programme. The WB would arrange more funds for the agriculture growth project

The meeting decided to constitute a team of the World Bank and the P&D department under its chairman Mohammad Waseem to smoothen the way for restricting, re-purposing and realigning the World Bank portfolio.

Renewable energy policy

The chief minister and the WB country director also discussed renewable energy projects. The WB would support Sindh in developing solar and wind power projects.

The energy minister briefed the meeting on the ongoing renewable projects and also discussed the options of hybrid renewable power projects.

Meanwhile, Syed Murad Ali Shah said on Monday that Sindh was much ahead of other provinces in conducting coronavirus tests and laboratories were working at 77 per cent capacity in the province.

“We have 19 laboratories to test coronavirus samples and they have the capacity to test 6,550 samples a day. Now they are operating at 77 per cent of their capacity,” he added.

In a statement issued from CM House, the chief minister said a coronavirus testing laboratory was also being established in Larkana, apart from establishing designated hospitals for Covid-19 patients.

New coronavirus cases

He said 864 new cases of the coronavirus were detected when 4,679 samples were tested, taking the total number of Covid-19 patients to 17,241 in the province.

Mr Shah said that overnight 4,679 tests were conducted which detected 864 cases, including 657 in Karachi. He added that so far 127,573 samples had been tested which turned 17,241 positive cases for the virus, constituting 13.5 per cent of the total tests.

According to the chief minister three more patients died, lifting the death toll to 280, which came to 1.6pc of the total patients.

“At present 12,472 patients are under treatment, of which 11,095, or 89 per cent, are in home isolation, 815, or six per cent, at the isolation centres and 562, or five per cent, in hospitals,” said Mr Shah, adding that 136 patients were in critical condition, including 29 put on ventilators.

He said 280 more patients had recovered and were discharged to lead normal lives under some SOPs and precautions. “We have 4,489 patients who have recovered and returned to their homes, which constitutes 26 per cent of the total patients,” he said and added that the recovery ratio in the province was static at 26pc and efforts were on to improve it further.

District-wise break-up

The chief minister said that out of the 864 patients, 657 belonged to Karachi. He added that 171 new cases had emerged in East district, 141 in Malir, 117 in South, 94 in Central, 75 in Korangi and 59 cases in West district.

He said that Ghotki had 31 new cases, Hyderabad 30, Larkana 21, Sukkur 17, seven in Qambar-Shahdadkot, five in Kashmore-Kandhkot, two each in Matiari and Naushahro Feroze and one each case in Shaheed Benazirabad, Khairpur and Jamshoro.

Published in Dawn, May 19th, 2020