Pakistan’s electricity tariff is considered to be highest in the world and this high power tariff coupled with high interest rates and frequent loadshedding are proving the biggest hurdles in smooth promotion of industrial and business activities in the country. In these circumstances, it will be a totally wrong decision to resort to further increasing the electricity tariff. This was stated by Shaban Khalid, Acting President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry while giving his reaction on some reports that government might go for increasing electricity rates to raise fund for settling the circular debt which has gone up to Rs.150 billion. He said electricity is the basic input for running the wheel of trade and industry and if its cost goes up, it will raise prices of all items produced by using electricity as raw material.

Shaban Khalid said the nation is already suffering from very high inflation and further hike in electricity tariff will make life worst for people, apart from crippling the business activities. He said oil prices have declined more than 65 percent in international market and government should have decreased electricity rates proportionately to pass on this benefit to the general public. But instead of reducing power tariff, mulling over to hike electricity rates to cope with circular debt issue will prove highly damaging for the economy and the country at large. Therefore, he called upon the government to desist from considering any such move; otherwise, it will plunge in deep troubles the already struggling trade and industry and will make the economic scenario more gloomy which is under stress owing to global recession.

Giving some suggestions to cope with energy crisis, ICCI Acting President proposed that government should focus on producing cheap electricity by using domestic resources of coal and hydro power and renewable resources of wind and solar energy. He said dependence on oil and gas should be reduced to bare minimum because of fluctuating prices of former and domestic needs of latter. He said Pakistan has huge hydro-power potential of generating around 40000MW of electricity that remains untapped fully while the wind energy alone has a potential of generating 50000MW with an estimated investment of $30 billion. He said the emphasis should be shifted to replacing thermal component by renewable energy resources that have a lot of potential and government should take steps to exploit these sources to cope with energy crisis.