Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has invited Netherlands top companies to establish waste-to-energy projects in Karachi and use the latest technology to depollute Manchhar.

This emerged on Friday when Ambassador of Netherlands Willem Wouter Plomp along with his Trade Advisor Hammad Raza and Trade Counsellor Yasir Farooqui called him at CM House in Karachi.

Read more: Dutch companies keen to invest in solid waste energy in Pakistan

The visiting ambassador told the chief minister that their companies were interested in investing and establishing the `Waste-to-Energy’ project in Karachi. “We have one of the top companies in the world working in the waste to energy sector,” he disclosed.

At this, the chief minister said that over 11000 tons of waste was generated in the city and it could produce 200 MW of energy. The chief minister directed Minister Energy Imtiaz Shaikh to meet with the team of Netherlands and finalise the modus operandi for the proposed project.

Meanwhile, he also directed Special Assistant on Investment Syed Qasim Naveed to hold a separate meeting with the investors of the Netherlands so such a project could be moved forward.

The Netherlands diplomat also offered investment and operation of a waste management project in the city.

The chief minister said that Manchhar Lake, located in his constituency, Sehwan, was one of the largest lakes of the world. He added that due to the disposal of saline water and some other issues the entire lake has become polluted. Hundreds of fishermen, who used to fish in the lake, have become jobless. “If the lake is depolluted hundreds of fishermen would return to their jobs and its water could be used for drinking and irrigation purposes,” Mr. Shah said.

The ambassador told the chief minister that he would send experts to visit the lake and would give technical advice so that a project could be made to clean it.

Read more: Karachi to produce electricity from its solid waste

The meetings between the Netherlands investors and experts are being fixed with the officers concerned to finalise the project.

The meeting was attended by CM Special Assistant on Investment Syed Qasim Naveed and Principal Secretary to CM Fayaz Jatoi.