HYDERABAD, Jan 29: Sindh Minister for Industries and Commerce Rauf Siddiqui said on Thursday that Sindh had the potential to become hub of export-oriented industries if the bottlenecks impeding the process of industrialisation were removed.

The minister said after performing stone-laying ceremony of Rs1064.133 million water supply pipeline that would bring water from Keenjhar Lake to the Site area in Nooriabad that the government was trying hard to provide modern infrastructure and facilities to industrialists to promote industrialization.

The government had announced 10-year tax exemption and allotment of industrial plots on easy installments to industrialists so that they could contribute to economic growth of the province and the country as well, he said.

He directed to form a three-member team to monitor progress on the project and report to him on a regular basis and directed Ali Ahmed, Secretary of Industries, Asif Marghoob Siddiqui, Managing Director of SITE, Shamsuddin Sehto, chief engineer of the project to complete the two-year project within eight months.

He said the best way to eradicate poverty was to create jobs by bringing in investment, which was possible only when the government put in place modern facilities in its industrial estates.

“We may have sufficient power, energy and road network but the entire industrial process will come to a halt if clean water is not provided to industries,” said the minister.

He warned government officers against delaying tactics and advised them to work diligently.

Seeing a vacant industrial plot or a sick non-operating industrial unit always stirred a feeling of loss because it meant loss of countless job opportunities that could have been created by utilising the plot, Mr Siddiqui said.

The industrialists present at the ceremony said that neglected infrastructure was the main cause of slowdown in industrialisation process. Even basic necessities like availability of water had been ignored in the past that increased cost of production, they said.