PESHAWAR, Dec 8: The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (Smeda) is in the process of selecting a private firm for the establishment of a model quarry and a mining training institute in district Buner, according to official sources.

Involving an investment of about Rs49 million by the federal government, the project, which would be carried out as a joint venture between public and private sectors, has received an encouraging response from the private mining sector of the marble-rich Buner.

Eight firms, which are involved in mining activities in Buner, had showed interest in entering into a joint venture with the public sector to run the training institute which aims at introducing modern technology for marble and granite mining and to producing skilled manpower and reducing mining losses which presently stand at a high level.

The Export Development Fund, a federal government entity, ahs already granted its approval for the mining institute, which would serve as a demo-cum-training project.

"The mining training institute would be the first of its kind in Pakistan which would help the country to effectively utilize its potential in the marble and granite sector," claimed an official of the industries department.

Three firms, out of the eight who applied for the joint venture, have been short-listed during a screening process conducted by the institute's management board which has been put in place by the agencies supervising the execution of the project, including Smeda, the Export Promotion Bureau and the Frontier Mine Owners Association.

The official said that a meeting between the representatives of the short-listed firms and members of the management board would be held on Dec 13 to discuss various aspects of the project.

Final selection of the firm would be made on the basis of the amount of funds the private sector would be willing to invest in the project, the size of their respective mine and facilities there, in addition to the type of machinery each one of them was using.

The project is supposed to become operational from July 15, 2005, when training to the first batch of trainees in modern mining techniques and use of modern machinery would start.

A team of experts, said the sources, would formulate curriculum for trainees and a foreign quarry expert would be hired to impart training. Negotiations for hiring a foreign quarry master, said the sources, were in progress.