The Cabinet Committee on the state-owned enterprises has found out that the overall performance of all 84 state-owned enterprises is unsatisfactory despite huge fiscal injections.
These enterprises are functioning under the administrative control of 19 federal ministries.
The finding came in a committee meeting called to discuss the governance reforms on the state-owned enterprises and the reconstitution of the Board of Directors of Sarmaya-i-Pakistan Limited.
It was unearthed in the meeting that during 2017-18 an amount of Rs 143 billion was provided to various SOEs as subsidies, Rs 204 billion as cash development loan, Rs 27 billion as equity injection and GoP guarantees amounting to Rs 318 billion were issued. Despite such large support, the SOEs sector as a whole registered net losses of Rs 265 billion.
The Ministry of Finance which gave its presentation attributed the poor performance of the SOEs to various factors such as redundancies and duplications, a completely decentralized governance framework with lack of inter-agency coordination, excessive interference and over-regulation by multiple government agencies and lack of technical expertise and specialized skills in the line ministries for the management of commercial CEOs.
The meeting was also attended by Dr. Ishrat Hussain who has been engaged in restructuring and reorganization of the federal government.
Dr Ishrat Hussain’s proposals which also include a plan for state-owned institutions have been approved by the cabinet. He informed the moot that the reforms suggested by his group were being implemented at different levels.
The federal government is to decide which SOEs should be privatized and which to be liquidated, wound up, or closed down and which were to be reorganized and retained by the government or merged with other entities.

Punjab which announced its budget for 2020-21 will have Rs337 billion for its Annual Development Programme (ADP). The figure shows a 9.42 percent increase against last year’s Rs308bn.
Provincial budget documents showed that 29pc of the ADP will go to the social sector, followed by 23pc to infrastructure development, 14pc to special initiatives, 13pc for services sector, 5pc for production sector and 15pc for others.
Of the total ADP, 35pc has been earmarked for 11 districts of south Punjab “to uplift the living standard of people of the area as well as to improve the socio-economic indicators”. These funds have been ring-fenced and will not be diverted unlike in the past.
Overall, a sum of Rs47bn has been earmarked for the Covid-19 — Punjab Economic Stimulus Programme — to invest in tackling the health crisis and catalyze economic growth.
In this regard, Rs30bn have been allocated for small works programs that will provide sustainable livelihood opportunities, Rs8bn to support the Micro Small Medium Enterprise (MSME) sector and skill training programs and Rs9bn for Communicable Disease Programme to help combat the pandemic.
Following the disruptions in the education sector due to the pandemic, Rs80 million have also been earmarked for Taleem Ghar Initiative to help identify missed School Learning Outcomes, content generation for distant learning and strengthening digital infrastructure.
Moreover, in view of the threat to food and agriculture sectors from the locust invasion, an initiative titled the Locust Control Operation and Allied Matters in Cholistan Initiative will combat the major threat to food security.
An amount of Rs12bn has been allocated to the Health Insurance Programme to improve access of poor populations to good quality medical services, through a micro health insurance scheme.
However, the government has reduced allocations for the agriculture sector to Rs8.065bn from Rs15.5bn in the last year’s ADP. The ADP announced a new initiative of the Rural Enterprises in Agriculture Development to promote agribusiness projects through private investment for generating income and rural employment.
At least Rs11.86bn have been allocated for 1,348 schemes of water supply and sanitation, while Rs2.5bn have been given separately to the Punjab Abe-Pak Authority for the provision of clean drinking water in various districts, especially in south Punjab.
The government claims that the ADP 2020-21 has been designed to counter the education and health crisis and other challenges faced by the economy of the province. Livelihood security through social protection schemes; investments to fill health infra

Indus Motor Company (IMC), manufacturers of Toyota vehicles in Pakistan, has made Rs20 million contribution to “The Prime Minister’s COVID-19 Pandemic Relief Fund 2020”.
Ali Asghar Jamali, CEO Indus Motor handed over the cheque to the Prime Minister during his recent meeting. He also presented a cheque for Rs10 million for the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital & Research Centre.
He appreciated the Government’s tireless efforts to overcome the public-health challenge and to safeguard the nation’s community and economy. With regards to his company’s contribution amidst COVID-19 pandemic, Ali Asghar Jamali said, “With the rising number of confirmed cases and fatalities, our country requires support from every quarter to strengthen Government’s efforts to fight the pandemic. IMC has made significant efforts in providing ration hampers to more than 10,000 needy and underprivileged families during the government lockdown. Extending support to front-line medical workers, IMC also donated medical equipment and PPEs to hospitals. We hope that our contribution will help the government to strengthen the health infrastructure to mitigate and contain this deadly infection as soon as humanly possible.” He further emphasized, At this time of crisis, the corporate community and the civil society need to be united and contribute additional resources to help eliminate hunger, disease, and poverty, while paving the way for an early economic recovery

Two new Lathe Machines have been added in the Mechanical Department laboratory of Government Polytechnic Institute (GPI), Mithi.
Some two years ago Thar Engro PowerGen Ltd/Thar Foundation entered into a partnership with STEVTA to improve the learning environment of the Institute by improving infrastructure, upgrading laboratories, the of faculty, and providing scholarships to local students.
A committee called as Institutional Management Committee was constituted to steer the improvement process of the Institution. Now, every year 75 Thari students are being given a full scholarship to complete Diploma Course, infrastructure is being improved, laboratory equipment is being added, new faculty have been recruited and on-site practical learning at Thar coal site has also been introduced.
All these steps have brought significant improvement in the Institution. These two Lathe machines are also part of improving laboratories and workshops for better learning for local students.