ISLAMABAD, May 10: The Competitive Support Fund (CSF), a joint initiative of the ministry of finance and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), has decided to strengthen public-private partnership to enhance Pakistan's competitiveness both through financial and technical means.

Mr Arthur Bayhan, the chief executive officer (CEO) of CSF, informed the senior Pakistani officials here on Thursday that the CSF, which is the partner institute of the World Economic Forum (WEF), would provide all the necessary support to help establish public-private partnership aimed at increasing the country's exports.

He further informed the officials, who also included State Minister for Economic Affairs Ms Hina Rabbani Khar, about the CSF joint initiatives with the WEF in Pakistan and emphasized the importance of the private sector to be a part of the community of the global growth companies of the WEF.

Mr Bayhan said that the CSF was working closely with the private sector leaders, including the Pakistan Business Council, to select these companies.

He also pointed out that the meeting of the forum will be held in Dalian, China, from September 6 to 8, 2007. The meeting is on the global growth companies.

He said Pakistan's goal to be of a more competitiveness economy by providing input into policy decisions, working to improve regulatory and administrative frameworks and enhancing public-private partnerships within the country will be fully supported. Support for CSF is part of the $1.5 billion in aid that the US government is providing to Pakistan over five years to improve economic growth, education, health, and governance.

On this occasion, Ms Khar said that Pakistan's private sector should increase its presence at the WEF.

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz will be the keynote speaker at the WEF on the Middle East meeting. The theme of this year's forum on the Middle East is ‘Putting Diversity to Work’.

The conference will spotlight efforts to accelerate economic diversification in a time of prosperity for the region, while emphasising the urgency of promoting peace and understanding in a region of great religious and ethnic diversity.

Pakistan's participation in this summit will also provide an opportunity for the private sector to be a part of the international business community. It is expected that more than 20 companies from the private sector in Pakistan will be participating in this event.

Later, the CSF delegation also made a presentation to Mr Anwar Mehmood, secretary information and broadcasting on the Global Competitiveness Indicator (GCI) on media, effecting Pakistan's competitiveness rankings. The secretary was briefed on the methodology of WEF to assess country's ranking.

Mr Bayhan also briefed the secretary on the innovation journalism programme that CSF is carrying out in collaboration with the Stanford University. The programme is designed to create awareness in the media and working journalists on innovation and competitiveness issues.

The meetings were part of CSF's initiative to bring all the line- ministries on board to improve Pakistan's ranking on the GCI of the WEF.

Pakistan ranked 91 on the GCI in 2006, where it showed improvement of 3 points from 94 to 91 in 2005. One of the prime reasons for Pakistan's low ranking on the GCI has been identified due to the non-availability of updated data to the international sources.

The WEF uses the hard data available to the international sources for evaluating the competitiveness of the nations. The soft data for the GCI is measured through executive opinion surveys, where more then 11,000 international business leaders provide their input on their experiences in the respective economies.

The State of Pakistan's Competitiveness Report of the CSF and the WEF annual Global Competitiveness Report (GCR) identified lack of timely data provision to the international sources as one of the main reasons for Pakistan's low ranking in the GCR.