Senators want more money for science ministry

Wants spending increased to 4% of GDP from current 0.00025%

Senate Standing Committee on Science and Technology in its meeting recommended increasing the annual budget of the ministry and the 16 organisations working with it.

The committee expressed its concerns over the alarmingly low percentage of 0.00025 of the GDP spent on this sector and called for reforms and bringing this percentage up to four per cent. The committee in the inaugural briefing was told that for the year 2017-18, the ministry was given a total of Rs6.39 billion in the head of non-development budget and Rs2.49 billion as the development budget.



The meeting was held under the Chairmanship of Senator Mushtaq Ahmed in Islamabad at the Parliament House on Tuesday. The committee observed that Pakistan today is facing a severe case of water scarcity, energy shortage and drastic climatic changes and if urgent measures are not taken, there could be disastrous consequences. The committee discussed possible reparative actions that could be taken to prevent any such disasters.

Committee chairman remarked that reforms in the area of science and technology have made strategic locations and availability of natural resources irrelevant for many countries and success in science and technology has proven to be a decisive factor in progress and development of many countries. He said that despite being a nuclear state, we are facing shortfall in electricity and are declared as a water scarce country.

Members of the committee were also of the view that the ministry and its attached departments should help spread awareness about new technologies available for saving water and other resources.



In order to take precautionary measures, the committee also directed to having a strategy to avoid misuse of 60% of the water in the agriculture sector, to make use of the excessive rain water and to make seawater usable through desalination and reverse osmosis.

Moreover, the committee called for developing more opportunities for spotting and grooming young scientists from educational institutions and having a ten year plan for the purpose as well as a ten year plan for reforms in the science and technology sector, more human resources, funds, a budget and a roadmap of strategic policy.

The committee also directed the ministry to give details of all those eatable products that are being imported in the country and whether they are Halal or not.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 13^th, 2018.