KARACHI, March 17: Minister for Textile Industry Makhdoom Shahabuddin said on Thursday that the government would endeavor to complete the pilot project of Textile City at Port Qasim within stipulated time because 20 more such cities would be developed across the country.

However, he admitted the project was much behind the schedule as many important features are yet to come on ground and hoped that by the year 2013, it would be completed.

Talking to newsmen during his tour of the textile city to see the progress and on-going development work, the minister said he would take up the gas issue needed for the 250MW power plant of the project with the prime minister.

Responding to a question, Makhdoom Shahabuddin said the country is presently faced with energy and gas shortages and industries in the Punjab are getting gas for five days a week.

He further said industrial revival will take place and the Presidential Ordinance of March 15, 2011 has not imposed any new taxes but an attempt has been made to mobilise funds for the losses caused by last year’s unprecedented floods.

The minister said that colossal damage and financial loss to the tune of $10 billion by the floods need contingency plan under which funds have to be mobilised locally. He also agreed that agriculture sector should also be taxed under such plans.

Petrol prices the world over have increased by 26 per cent but the government has only shifted 50 per cent of the burden on consumers and the 50 per cent balance is being absorbed by the government, he added.

Earlier, the CEO of the Textile City, Zaheer A Hussain, and general manager technical operations Col (retd) Syed Asif Jamal with the help of slides and charts gave progress report of various works of the city to the minister.

The minister was informed that land leveling has been almost completed at an estimated cost of Rs500 million and presently water work is in progress under which a covered reservoir of 20mgd at an estimated cost of Rs670 million is under progress. Some vital roads have been completed at a cost of Rs125 million, he maintained.

The total area of the textile city is spread over 1250 acres and around 277 industrial plots of different sizes have been designed to meet the need of different industries, Mr Hussain said.

The city has the capacity to export textile goods worth $2 billion per annum, he added.

He informed the minister that Pakistan Textile City paid Rs1 million per acre to Port Qasim, but now the price of the land has increased to around Rs7 million per acre. He requested the minister to arrange a piece of land for developing workers colony so that workforce could be available at a short distance for the industries of the city.

However, he expressed his concern over non-availability of gas for the city’s power plant of 250MW and said even after issuing Letter of Intent (LOI) to the company for power plant on BOO basis, no progress could be made.

Mr Hussain said that the plant could also be run on coal but the decision has to be taken by the board of directors of the city.

Due to delay in the project, he said instead of giving incentives to prospective investors, the cost is escalating. He said that KWSB in their original PC-I estimated the cost of Rs636 but under revised estimates the cost has increased to Rs1.351 billion for 23km and 48 inch pipeline for the textile city.

He lamented that the KWSB never mentioned connection charges of Rs2.8 billion in their PC-I but now they are demanding such a huge amount which the textile city does not have.

Zaheer A Hussain said though the paid-up capital of the Pakistan Textile City is Rs1.25 billion, but so far it has borrowed around Rs1.5 billion from the National Bank of Pakistan under government guarantees. He said that Rs1 billion had been paid for the acquired land from the PQA.