Subsidies to Public Sector Units Hurt Education in Pakistan

[Riaz Haq]

"...under 1.5% of GDP [is] going to public schools that are on the front line of Pakistan's education emergency, or less than the subsidy for PIA, Pakistan Steel, and Pepco." Pakistan Education Task Force Report 2011

Pakistan has ordered 5 Boeing 777s and 75 train engines for its state-owned companies in a bid to catch up with rising passenger and cargo service demands, according to media reports.

Boeing, the American aerospace giant, has announced the $1.5 billion deal with Pakistan International Airline (PIA) which includes a firm order of five 777-300ER (extended range) jets as well as the purchase rights for an additional five, according to Fox News.

Separately, The News is reporting that Pakistan Railway is purchasing 75 Chinese-made train engines for $105 million.

Highways have now become the most important segment of transport sector in the country, according to the Economic Survey of Pakistan. At the time of Pakistan's independence in 1947, transportation by roads accounted for only 8% of all traffic. Today, it accounts for 92% of national passenger traffic and 96% of freight.

The last decade has seen major competition coming from first-class private bus services now operated on modern motorways in all parts of Pakistan. The best known of these is Daewoo bus service with its comfortable luxury coaches and stewardesses offering meal services. With the construction and expansion of national highways and motorways, the trucking industry has also grown by leaps and bounds in the last few decades.

In mid-90s, Pakistan Railway had 10.45% share of passenger traffic and 5.17% of freight traffic, which has declined to 9.95% and 4.72% respectively by the year 2006-07, according to Economic Survey of Pakistan.

Pakistan Railway has been weighed down by heavy expenses of payroll and rising corruption and incompetence. As a result, a large number of engines are no longer operational and there have been big cuts in service.

After gaining domestic and international traffic market share for several decades after independence, Pakistan International airline has been losing it in recent decades because of serious problems of corruption and mismanagement by the cronies of the ruling politicians. PIA is now losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year while being hit by lean and mean domestic private airlines and international competition from rising Gulf giants like Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways.

Today, PIA's employee to aircraft ratio of 450 is more than twice as much as some of its competitors. "Politically motivated inductions have been the major cause of the significant increase in human resource burden in this organization," the State Bank of Pakistan said recently.

Pakistani taxpayers are heavily subsidizing the national airline at the expense of much more crucial public sectors like education. Last year, a Pakistani government commission on education found that public funding for education has been cut from 2.5% of GDP in 2007 to just 1.5% - less than the annual subsidy given to the various PSUs including PIA, the national airline that continues to sustain huge losses.

The latest example of the use of public funds to buy support for the government is Rs 366 million given in "discretionary development funds" as reward to senators for passing the 20th Constitutional Amendment with more than two-third majority, according to Pakistani media reports.

The crux of the issue for the bloated public sector units like PIA, Pakistan Steel Mills and Pakistan Railways is the reprehensible system of political patronage which puts the wrong people in charge of them. The sooner PIA, PR and other PSUs become privatized, the easier it will be to revive them for better service and improved profitability. It will turn them into a source of much needed revenue for the public treasury, just as the denationalization of banks did in the last decade.

From an after-tax loss of Rs. 9.77 billion in 2001 (when MCB, Habib, UBL and Allied were government owned) the earnings of these privatized banks rose to a profit after-tax of Rs. 73.115 billion in 2007. Higher earnings meant increased tax contribution by these banks to the government from Rs 10.8 billion in 2001 to Rs. 33.8 billion in 2007, according to data provided by former State Bank governor Mr. Shahid Kardar.

Even if privatization of the heavily subsidized public sector units does not yield higher tax revenue from them, it will at least free up public funds for more pressing needs like education, health care, energy, water and public infrastructure development.

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[Riaz Haq]

Here's Daily Times on Thai Airways increasing flights to-from Pakistan:

LAHORE: Thai Airways International has increased its flight frequencies on various destination of Pakistan including Karachi, Islamabad and Lahore. Accordingly, flights from Lahore have been increased to 6 days a week. There will be five flighs from Karachi and four from Lahore.Thai Airways has been operating in Pakistan for about 37 year’s nonstop, so we have long association with our Pakistani customers. The airlines is one of the pioneers of facilitating 100 certified Halal Food on board to flights BKK TO Pakistan V.V. Passengers don’t have to request for Halal food or Muslim food en-routing to flight from /to Bangkok–Pakistan.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2013\02\01\story_1-2-2013_pg10_3

[Riaz Haq]

Here's a Chinese report on Pakistan buying 600 million yuan (approx US$ 100) worth of locomotives:

(Beijing) – Shanghai-listed railway equipment manufacturer CSR Corp. Ltd. won bids for contracts in Pakistan and Turkmenistan on February 4.

CSR's subsidiary in Ziyang, Sichuan Province, will make 50 locomotives for Pakistan. CSR expects to deliver the first 10 by the end of the year and the rest by the end of May 2014.

Turkmenistan ordered 154 passenger cars and they will be delivered this year. CSR's wholly owned subsidiary in Nanjing will make the cars.

CSR did not say how much the contracts were worth. However, a CSR source said the usual price for 50 locomotives was about 600 million yuan, and that for 154 cars was 400 million yuan.

Last month, CSR's subsidiary in Qingdao, Shandong Province, won a 3.43 billion yuan contract to make electric train units for Argentina. It was the largest South American contract by value for a Chinese railway equipment manufacturer.

CSR is in talks with several international clients for other contracts, the source at the company said. This year its overseas sales are expected to surpass those of 2012.

CSR's revenue in the first half of last year was 42.4 billion yuan, up 5.8 percent compared to the same period in 2011, its financial report shows. Its revenue from overseas over that period was 4.8 billion yuan, rising 95.58 percent. The company's overseas revenue over the first six months of 2012 accounted for 11.33 percent of its total revenue, the first time the figure reached double-digits.

http://english.caixin.com/2013-02-05/100489915.html

[Riaz Haq]

Here's Khaleej Times on Etihad Airline adding flights to and from Pakistan:

Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates, has increased its flights to the Northern city of Lahore from seven to 11 a week offering passengers more convenient travel options.

With the addition of the new services, Etihad Airways will now offer 27 weekly flights from four destinations in Pakistan which, along with Lahore, include Karachi, Islamabad and Peshawar.

The additional services will be operated by A320 aircraft fitted with 16 Pearl Business Class seats and will increase capacity by 21 per cent on the route.

These services also improve the number of connections over the airline’s Abu Dhabi hub to more than 500 connections a week (representing an increase of 20 per cent) to a number of key destinations in the GCC and Europe.

“The addition of the new flights will further strengthen commercial and cultural ties between Pakistan and the UAE and will lead to continued strong growth in traffic flows between Lahore, Abu Dhabi and beyond to many key destinations across our global network,” said Kevin Knight, Etihad Airways’ Chief Strategy and Planning Officer.

Since the start of flights to Lahore in 2006, Etihad Airways has carried more than one million passengers on this route.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/kt-article-display-1.asp?xfile=data/nat...§ion=nationgeneral

[Riaz Haq]

Here's a News blog post on GeoTV's program "Chal Parha" hosted by singer Shehzad Roy:

We’ve seen some scintillating performances by Shehzad Roy ranging from ’Laga rahay’ to ‘Uth Baandh Kamar kya Darta hai’. His proximity with the general public and the extent to which he seeks solutions for the myriad problems being faced by Pakistan, exhibit his patriotism. On the other hand, his non-governmental organization – ‘Zindagi Trust’
has burgeoned up since 2007 to contest the case of ‘education emergency’ in Pakistan.

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A pop-singer, Roy is both a motivation and a lesson for any young adult living in this country. Unlike many, he isn’t chasing projection in the neighbouring media outlets, allured by ‘piles of money’ or the lust for fame. If he continues with his efforts, there are good enough chances for him to introduce a new ‘genre’ in Pakistani music industry- something like ‘social responsibility’.

Similar to other institutional transitions budding in the Pakistani society, ‘music’ also requires a reorientation. The mass media (including ‘music’ as a means of communication) is also ploughing for a ‘fresh crop’ that wants to satisfy the need of ‘social uplift’.

Making the message of ‘positive change’ vocal, isn’t an easy task. However, ‘music’ seems to be the compatible format considering the level of ignorance and illiteracy in the Pakistani society. Any nation heading towards intellectual demise should be purported by arts, literature and music to engender the thirst for ‘knowledge’.

Chal Parha- a new program being aired on GEO TV during prime time slot is a success story for the local media. It is for the first time that the most urgent need of the country has seeped into the electronic media to grab the ‘time’ and ‘space’ of a television channel. The show is unique with regards to purpose and format. Above all, it has the privilege of ‘Shehzad Roy’ serving as a testimonial. As the renowned singer himself says: “In this show, I travel across 80 cities in Pakistan from Attabad Jheel and Gulmit to Gojal and Thar and film in more than 200 government schools. In each episode we highlight an issue from public schools for example, corporal punishment, medium of instruction, population, textbooks, curriculum, teachers etc”
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The promotional song (Chal Parha) of the program defines the digression of the society, in general, for not giving due attention to ’education’. In a light yet piercing manner, the lyrics serve as a stringer for the listeners. It is a rhythmic reminder to rescue the country from the darkness of illiteracy through the light of ’education’. Moreover, an allusion towards another dilemma of the society has also been made, that is, the non-acceptance or indifference shown to talented people. Roy selects a young girl hailing from Faisalabad as a co-vocalist for the song in order to encourage her exceptional singing abilities. She complains of the lack of projection given to talented individuals in Pakistan, the reason she hums melodiously: Pair ho par saya na ho, din ho par ujala na ho, aisaa mumkin nahi… (‘how can hope and darkness coexist?’). Shehzad aptly responds to this: Yai anhonee jo baat hai, mairay dais k saath hai (this strange thing is seen in ‘my’ country).

Chal Parha is another call to declare ‘education emergency’ in Pakistan – not just by adding Article 25-A in the Constitution, but to ensure its fair and proper implementation. It aims at revolutionizing the education system of the country for saving the lives of innumerable talented gems and to alter the fate of Pakistan.

http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2013/02/roys-chal-parha-education...

[Riaz Haq]

Here's a PakistanToday report on railway carriage restoration in Islamabad coach factory:

Islamabad Carriage Factory has rehabilitated 690 old coaches during the last three years, making them durable for another 20 years, an official said on Tuesday.

The factory which was established with the cooperation of the German government is capable of manufacturing 150 German-designed coaches each year.

"The Carriage Factory rehabilitated 20 coaches of meter gauge for Senegal Railway and manufactured new six slipper coaches for the Pakistan Army," an official told APP.

He said out of 400 dysfunctional coaches, 275 had been rehabilitated whereas work on the rest was already in progress. He added that the restoration of these coaches would help Pakistan Railways achieve progress.

The official said that Pakistan Railways would receive also 202 new coaches against a cost of around Rs 16 billion to improve its operations and to facilitate its passengers.

Out of the 202 coaches of various types, Pakistan Railways received 65 coaches in Completely Built Unit condition which are being utilised with different trains plying across the country.

He said the new coaches had the capacity to run at the speed of 160 km per hour but due to the dilapidated rail track it would run at 120 km.

http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2013/03/19/city/islamabad/carriage-...

[Riaz Haq]

Here's an Express Trib report on new private airlines in Pakistan:

Undeterred by devastating setbacks faced by private carriers over the past few years, three more business groups have applied for airline licences to start operations in the country, industry officials have told The Express Tribune.
Rayyan Air, Vision Air and Fly Pakistan Air have decided to enter the market at a time when a shortage of operational aircraft at the state-run Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has created room for more carriers.
Vision Air International and Fly Pakistan Air have filed requests for regular public transport licences with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), while a licence has already been issued to Rayyan Air, officials said.
“All three airlines are in different stages of commencing operations. All of them seem committed, but only time will tell how many will actually survive,” commented a senior CAA official.
These airlines follow in the footsteps of privately-run Bhoja Air and Indus Air, both of which were issued aviation licences last year. Within months of its launch, Bhoja’s maiden flight to Islamabad tragically crashed, killing all 127 persons onboard the aircraft. Since then, its aircraft have been grounded and seized by the CAA as the airline struggles to settle insurance claims.
----When Pakistan adopted an ‘open skies’ policy in the 1990s, more than 20 licences were issued to prospective airliners: almost none of them survived, the sole exception being Shaheen Air. Meanwhile, high fuel prices and stiff competition has already eroded the profitability of airlines around the world. However, Rayyan Air says this does not discourage serious investors.
“It is wrong to say those airlines failed because of market conditions. All of them tried to make quick money, losing sight of long-term goals,” said Bhatti.
Vision Air International is a completely new enterprise, put together by retired air vice marshal Aamer Sharif and a former managing director of Bhoja Air. However, it is equally optimistic about its prospects: “Pakistani air traffic is growing by 10-12% every year,” Sharif said. “Middle East-based airlines are flying more and more passengers out of Pakistan. There is a huge market here.”
The lack of serious competition has allowed existing domestic carriers to arbitrarily increase fares, he claimed. “There is room for at least two or three more airlines right now,” he added.
According to our sources, Fly Pakistan Air has many backers; including a son of ex-DG CAA Nadeem Khan Yousufzai, and industry veteran Haider Jalal. Jalal is a former managing director of Aero Asia, yet another airline that went belly-up a couple of years ago. A company official refused to provide any further insights, saying they are still in talks with government officials.
Around 15 million Pakistani passengers use airlines to travel every year, with 8.3 million of them flying to international destinations and the remaining flying to local cities.
Industry officials say running an airline is a capital-intensive business, which needs professionals to manage it properly.-----

http://tribune.com.pk/story/541002/aviation-industry-three-more-car...

[Riaz Haq]

Here's an FT report on Nawaz Sharif's plans to revive economy:

Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan’s new prime minister, will appoint private sector managers to run state companies in efforts to revive an economy starved of investment, say leaders of his party.
Mr Sharif, who has been prime minister twice before, launched a similar policy in 1997 when he appointed commercial bankers to run three large public sector banks. All three became profitable and two, Habib Bank and United Bank, were privatised.

The plan faces a backlash from trade unions. Mr Sharif’s aides compared the process to the privatisations in the UK by Margaret Thatcher after she became prime minister in 1979.
Sartaj Aziz, former finance and foreign minister and a leader of Mr Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, told the Financial Times: “The formula is simple. You appoint good people, you allow them to appoint their people and you empower them. The government helps wherever it can.”

Officials said Ishaq Dar, a confidant of Mr Sharif, would take up his former post of finance minister in the new government.
Final results have yet to be declared but business leaders have welcomed a vote that will probably allow Mr Sharif, a wealthy Punjabi steel magnate, to have an absolute majority in parliament without the need for coalition partners.
Investors in Pakistan said they were tired of grappling with power cuts of up to 20 hours a day, widespread corruption in public life and an inefficient public sector. Mr Sharif has identified rescuing the economy as his number one priority.
A central bank official said public sector companies in power, rail transport and aviation run up huge losses each year amounting to more than 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product. “These are clearly white elephants,” he said.
Mian Muhammad Mansha, the Lahore-based owner of a Pakistani conglomerate who is reputed to be the country’s richest man, approvingly quoted a reference to Thatcher as a “modern Joan of Arc” and said Pakistan needed structural reforms similar to hers.
“First you need to get all these public sector companies out of government control,” he said. “This will release so much money that they are losing and it will make politics clean.”

The 1997 bank plan saw Mr Sharif’s government dismiss some 20,000 employees who were all given large redundancy payments. The current reform plan may meet resistance not only from unions but from politicians who are used to arranging contracts for their businesses from public sector companies.

“Mr Sharif will have to keep his own politicians under control if he wants his plan to succeed. In the past, many have thrived on patronage,” said Suhail Jehangir Malik, an economist. “Public sector companies are a huge drain on our national economy. Reforming them must be a primary objective for the new government.”
The plan is likely to win support from international donors, including the International Monetary Fund, which is expecting to begin negotiations shortly on a new $9bn loan to stave off a balance of payments crisis. Pakistan’s foreign reserves are equivalent to the value of two months of imports.
“The problem with Pakistan is both macroeconomic weakness and long-term structural issues,” said one person involved in preliminary talks with the interim government in power over the election period. “Given the severity of the economic problems, we do need to have a government that is going to undertake quite serious economic reforms.”
Under a so-called extended fund facility of up to four years, Pakistan would be expected to cut its budget deficit by increasing tax revenues, directing subsidies more accurately towards the poor and introducing policies to encourage foreign direct investment.

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/374bc1a6-bbe8-11e2-a4b4-00144feab7de...

[Riaz Haq]

Here's a Bloomberg report on a new private airline launched in Pakistan:

Air Indus Pvt., the first Pakistani airline to start operations in almost a decade, plans to begin services to the Middle East next year, increasing competition for the loss-making Pakistan International Airlines Corp.
The carrier, which started operations July 28 with a flight to Pakistan’s capital Islamabad from its Karachi base, will seek to fly to countries including the United Arab Emirates, Malaysia and Thailand after the mandatory one year of domestic flights, Salman Ghazali, senior marketing manager at Air Indus, said by phone yesterday. The airline will initially offer two daily services each to Lahore and Islamabad and one to Quetta and plans to reach seven destinations next month.
The new airline joins Shaheen Air International Ltd. and Airblue Ltd. in competing for passengers in a market once dominated by the flag carrier Pakistan International Airlines, known as PIA. PIA, which has posted eight consecutive annual losses, has seen departures drop by about 10,000 in the last two years amid delays in upgrading an aging fleet, according to its latest annual report.
“Competition is great,” Sajid Habib, former deputy director general of Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority, said by telephone. “Air Indus may get passengers and dent PIA’s operations if flights are on time.”
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who returned to power in May, aims to boost economic growth to 4.4 percent and keep inflation in single digits this fiscal year. The government reached agreement with the International Monetary Fund this month on a $5.3 billion loan to boost the nation’s depleted currency reserves and help stabilize its struggling economy.
Boeing Fleet
Air Indus operates a fleet of two Boeing Co. 737-300 and one 737-301 aircraft, according to its website. The aircraft offers 148 economy class seats on each flight.
“The response was better than our expectation,” Ghazali said about the airline’s first flight. “We had 90 people in the 148-seat plane. Our commercial load was full, some guests could not make it. The way people are booking and travel agents are calling means there is a good response.”

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-29/air-indus-starts-local-...

[Riaz Haq]

Here's a Dawn story on Nawaz Sharif govt's privatization plan:

The government directed the Privatisation Commission on Thursday to immediately start the process for sale of 31 public sector entities (PSEs) through initial and secondary public offering and transfer of 26 per cent shares, along with management control, to the private sector.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Privatisation, presided over by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, to comply with a structural benchmark agreed to under the IMF programme.

Minister of Water and Power Khawja Asif, Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Minister for Planning and Development Ahsan Iqbal, Minister of State for Privatisation Khurram Dastagir, federal secretaries, the governor of the State Bank of Pakistan and chairmen of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan and the Board of Investment attended the meeting.

An official said the Council of Common Interests had approved these transactions in 2006, 2009 and 2011 and the CCOP just reiterated the government’s approval to go ahead with the ambitious privatisation programme.

The meeting considered a list of public sector companies submitted by the Privatisation Commission.

“After thorough deliberations, the committee agreed to initiate the process of privatisation and directed the commission to ensure that the interests of employees were to be protected at all cost,” said a statement issued by the ministry of finance.

“Most of the PSEs will be offered to the private sector through strategic divestment, including up to 26pc stakes along with management control, while shares of other companies will be offloaded through public offering,” an official told Dawn.

He said the committee did not take a decision on which companies be sold through strategic disinvestment because this was something the Privatisation Commission would propose after in-house deliberations and consultations with financial advisers.

The companies cleared for divestment include the Oil and Gas Development Company Limited, Pakistan Petroleum Limited, Mari Gas, Pak-Arab Refinery, Pakistan State Oil, Sui Southern Gas Company Limited, Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited, Pakistan International Airlines, PIA-Roosevelt Hotel, New York, Pakistan Railways, Gujranwala Electric Power Company, Lahore Electric Supply Company, Islamabad Electric Supply Company, Faisalabad Electric Supply Company, Northern Electric Generation Company, Pakistan Steel Mills, National Power Construction Company and Pakistan National Shipping Corporation.

The financial sector entities selected for sale in the first phase include National Bank of Pakistan, First Women Bank, Small and Medium Enterprises Bank, National Investment Trust Limited, National Insurance Company Limited, Pakistan Reinsurance Company Limited, State Life Insurance Corporation and House Building Finance Corporation.

The Civil Aviation Authority, Karachi Port Trust, Port Qasim Authority and National Highway Authority are also on the list.

The government has made a commitment with the IMF to announce a strategy for the sale of 30 firms by the end of September as a benchmark for disbursement of second tranche of the IMF loan. Under the commitment, the government is to announce privatisation plans for remainder of total 65 entities by the end of 2013.

“We are developing medium-term action plans to restructure the PIA, Steel Mills and Railways. The action plans include partial privatisation of companies through initial or secondary public offering,” the government had told the IMF....

http://www.dawn.com/news/1047333/31-enterprises-up-for-sale

[Riaz Haq]

Pak Supreme court should stay out of economic decisions like fixing prices for electricity. Targeted subsidies should be given to low income households to help with energy costs. General subsidies for electricity and petrol take 34% of government's revenue ,bust budget and raise deficits and drive inflation (by printing more money to pay) hurting the low-income people the most.

But I also believe Supreme Court's record on economic decisions like canceling steel mill privatization in 2005 is really bad. I want Chaudhry court to stay out of it

Energy subsidies in #Pakistan take up astounding 34% of gov revenue.Table A.3 of impressive IMF book:

http://www.cgdev.org/event/book-launch-and-discussion-energy-subsid...