‘7 per cent growth needed for 20 years’

Creating jobs for rising population seen as greatest challenge.

LAHORE:

National economy needs to maintain a growth rate of seven per cent for 20 years to provide jobs to the increasing population, Deputy Chairman Planning Commission Dr Nadeemul Haque said on Monday.

He was speaking at the inauguration ceremony of a two-day First International Conference on Contemporary Issues in Business Management 2011 at the University of Central Punjab.
Haq said that at current population growth rate the country’s population would be double its current size by 2050.

He said economic mismanagement was the biggest problem today.

He compared the economy to a game of cricket and said there were a set of principles and the government was the umpire whose job was to regulate the economy and provide a level-playing field to all stakeholders.

Haq said there was a need to improve productivity so that resources could be used more efficiently and national output increased. He said Pakistan was among the countries with the lowest productivity.

He said setting up new campuses would do no good to the economy unless quality human resource is available at these campuses.

He said investment could only be attracted by pursuing market-friendly policies. The government needs to develop new markets and facilitate their growth through subsidies,” he said.

Haq said the country needed to take immediate measures to solve its energy crisis. He said professional management and privatisation was the key to solving the country’s economic issues.

He said the the industries the government could not privatise immediately should at least be granted autonomy to manage their affairs on their own.

He urged the UCP administration to prioritise research. He congratulated the UCP for having gained a reputation for quality education within a very short time.

Orient Advertising Pvt. Ltd chief executive officer Syed Mahmood Hashmi and UCP pro-rector Dr Syed Tahir Hijazi also spoke on the occasion.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14th, 2011.