ISLAMABAD, Feb 19: About 125 projects have been removed from the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) and 432 others are facing implementation delays because the government is trying to reduce spending and bring down budget deficit to 4.2 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product.

The Planning Commission recently briefed the prime minister on the state of development activities and its document presents a rather gloomy picture of the pace of development.

While terrorist activities have taken a heavy toll on infrastructure and business and development activities, the process of releasing funds for several important projects has been quite slow.

The government has set the deficit target for 2008-09 at Rs562 billion which is 4.2 per cent of the GDP. It will need a funding of Rs350 billion from external sources and Rs212 billion from internal sources.

The cut in the PSDP is by now estimated at Rs100 billion, but sources in the finance ministry say that savings will go well beyond the figure by June 30.

According to the PC document, 170 of the 432 projects could not be implemented on time due to ‘lack of management capacity’. Delay in the release of funds has affected 73 projects and 60 others could not meet the completion deadline due to ‘inefficiency’ of contractors. Ten projects were delayed because of faults in designs, 16 due to inability of implementation authorities to acquire land and nine because of the law and order situation.

Twenty-seven projects could not be taken up on time because of delay in the appointment of staff or their absence.

Lack of coordination between provincial and federal governments affected eight projects and ‘delay in appointment of consultants’ another eight.

Problems in loan disbursement delayed five projects, while 46 projects failed to meet the deadline due to other factors.

Of about 100 infrastructure projects, 82 are facing delays of more than a year and five of one year. Eight are in the initial stage.

The government has approved 233 projects for social sector and only nine of them are on schedule. Of them, 173 projects are facing delays of more than a year and 34 of one year. Seventeen social sector projects are in the initial stage.

WATERCOURSES: The commission informed the prime minister that 68 per cent work on the National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses has been completed. The project has to be completed by 2010 and involves 86,043 watercourses. Work on 58,435 of them has been completed.

Only 621 watercourses have been lined in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas against the target of 1,600, because of the law and order situation. In Azad Kashmir, 251 watercourses have been improved against a target of 1,000.

About 30,000 watercourses were to be improved in Punjab, but work on only 177,44 has so far been completed. In Sindh, 16,611 watercourses have been improved against a target of 29,000. In the NWFP, however, the target of 10,000 watercourses has been met and in Balochistan work on 11,782 watercourses has been completed against a target of 13,466.