The Public Private Partnership Authority (PPPA) has the mandate to provide an enabling legal and regulatory framework for developing, executing, and implementing public-private transactions, thereby promoting private sector investment in building public infrastructure and the provision of related services. The PPPA has recently engaged the services of Kearney, a reputed consultancy firm with global expertise, particularly in the Middle East, to identify projects for investment and devise strategies for implementing these selected projects. Kearney has already engaged with 15 federal institutions and identified 97 priority projects. They are also interested in providing support for privatising State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), enhancing the regulatory framework for public sector enterprises, and attracting more investors to Pakistan. Sounds like déjà écouté!

We also have the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC), which has a mandate to bring investment into Pakistan with a vision to contribute towards the economic revival of the country by significantly expanding the investment pie from foreign and domestic sources. The objective of SIFC is to attract investments from friendly countries—mainly in the Middle East—in identified sectors through an empowered organisation that serves as a ‘single-window’ platform for facilitation and to improve the ease of doing business for potential investors. SIFC was created to overcome bureaucratic hurdles, structural inefficiencies, and other deficiencies that inhibit investment in Pakistan.

Similarly, in the past, many consultants and advisors have been hired—and paid in hard foreign cash—to improve the performance of SOEs, privatise PIA and other SOEs such as Pakistan Steel Mills. Consultancy firms were also hired, and a few committees formed to improve the efficiency of DISCOs, and now the government has finally decided to privatise them. Then we have departments such as the Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP), which has a mandate to improve the country’s exports. It regularly holds and participates in international exhibitions. However, despite GSP+ status, our textile exports have dropped. Similarly, we have the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Authority (SMEDA) to promote SMEs in the country, but de-industrialisation has been happening for the past couple of decades. Likewise, the government has held roadshows in Europe and China to attract foreign investment, but other than spending precious foreign exchange on foreign junkets by government functionaries, nothing substantive has been achieved. Thus, despite spending millions of dollars on consultants and consulting firms, exhibitions, and roadshows, there is nothing concrete to show for the dollars spent.

Unfortunately, every government department is keen to bring ‘foreign’ investment to the country but does not encourage facilitating the ‘local investors’: listening to their problems, helping them navigate the bureaucratic maze, providing a level playing field by offering them safe facilities as offered to foreign investors, and providing basic infrastructure for setting up industries. Local investors do not need any foreign consultancy or dollar-funded consultants to persuade them to invest in Pakistan; they just need to be heard.

The real problem is that every government wants a quick-fix solution through a magic wand, and instead of removing inefficiencies, minimising bureaucratic involvement, eliminating corruption, and hiring technocrats to do the job, new departments are created with overlapping scope and mandate, which only increases inefficiencies and further complicates the investment environment of the country. Moreover, the government is not trying to improve the general socio-economic indicators of the country, such as the rule of law: where the law is equal for everyone and the life and property of every citizen are protected. Furthermore, the government needs to invest in basic infrastructure such as strategic roads and highways that connect industrial cities and regions, and ensure the provision of utilities such as electricity and gas at competitive rates. Without the basic groundwork, no matter how hard the government tries to attract investment with lofty advertisements, roadshows, or tax breaks, no company that does its due diligence will invest in Pakistan.

Ahsan Munir
The writer is a freelance columnist.