Pakistan to adopt Chinese model of economic development, says Ahsan Iqbal

ISLAMABAD: Ahsan Iqbal, Federal Minister for Planning, Development, and special initiatives declared on Thursday that Pakistan will adopt the Chinese model of economic development, which he called a modern-day miracle.

According to the Chinese, modern economic development is only possible if political stability, social solidarity, and economic policies are maintained; Federal Minister for Planning Development and Special Initiatives Professor Ahsan Iqbal stated this while speaking at the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Green Development, High-Level Dialogue hosted by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) here.

According to the Minister, Pakistan has traditionally lacked political stability and continuity in economic policy, making economic progress impossible.
According to Ahsan Iqbal, China’s industrial shift was scheduled for 2020, and “we did not have the facilities to profit from this transition.”

During this time, China’s industrial units were relocated to Vietnam and the countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

According to the Minister, the government of Pakistan began construction on nine Special Economic Zones (SEZs) under CPEC in 2013, but “we could not complete even one of them” during the previous administration. He claims that if these SEZs had been built, China’s industrial relocation would have occurred in Pakistan by now.

According to Ahsan Iqbal, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif launched the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in 2013 with a $46 billion investment in infrastructure and energy projects.
He stated on this occasion that China and Pakistan had decided to collaborate on a green economy.

He stated that China’s present leadership believes in environmentally friendly industrial growth and that in the future, they would place a premium on environmentally friendly regulations in new projects.
He stated that Pakistan and China were collaborating on various green energy projects that would benefit the environment.

According to Ahsan, the majority of the solar and wind energy projects would usher in a new age of sustainable economic development in the country.

He stated that anti-environmental industrial development had also contributed to the degradation of the world’s ecology and that Pakistan had suffered as a result.
“Today, Pakistan is one of the five major countries hit by environmental challenges,” he remarked.

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Speaking to reporters on the occasion, Ahsan Iqbal blasted the CPEC Authority, claiming that no money has been put into the project since its establishment.
Previously, $29 billion has been invested in the CPEC project.
As a result, “we are returning to the mechanism used from 2013 to 2019 so that this project may be implemented properly.”

He stated that China has committed to investing more in this initiative.