ISLAMABAD: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the United Kingdom have agreed to fund a key section of the M-4 motorway in Punjab, which will cut travel time and support the government’s goal of improving flow of goods and people along the country’s north-south corridor route.

The ADB is providing a project loan of $178 million and administering a $92m equivalent grant from the British government to build a four-lane section of the motorway linking Gojra and Shorkot, the bank announced on Thursday.

The construction of the Gojra-Shorkot section which involves construction of 62km of highway is part of three construction packages. Under package-I, the Faisalabad-Gojra section has been completed. The third package involves construction of 64km of highway from Shorkot to Khanewal.

The project, which includes counterpart support of $46m from the government, will continue for four years and is expected to be completed by November, 2019.

The National Highway Authority (NHA) will execute the project. The proposed motorway is part of the National Trade Corridor Highway Investment Programme and will provide easy access to traders and farmers for transportation of goods to other parts of the country by reducing the time required for transportation.

Once completed, the M-4 motorway, which will connect Faisalabad and Multan and is part of the corridor, will provide a faster, safer, more cost-effective north-south route to the currently overburdened National Highway.

The NHA intends to build the Faisalabad-Khanewal Motorway (M-4) as part of the national trade corridor projects. The proposed motorway project with other NTC projects will provide reliable and safe means of transportation of goods between the Central Asian region and China and Karachi and Gwadar ports.

The project will help improve trade activities and in turn increase the economic growth rate of the country. The motorway will allow residents of the Faisalabad, Toba Tek Singh, Khanewal and Multan districts to travel with ease to Islamabad, Rawalpindi and Lahore, and will provide a safe, congestion-free and high-speed facility to commuters of the project area as well.

“Road transportation dominates Pakistan’s transport system, but much of the national highway network was built before the 1950s and comprises poor-quality, two-lane roads which struggle to cope with current high levels of traffic, including heavily-laden freight trucks,” said Zheng Wu, Transport Specialist in ADB’s Central and West Asia Department.

“The project supports the government’s goals of decongesting highways and improving the north-south corridor to reduce the time and cost of moving people and goods, which is a major constraint to raising competitiveness and attracting private sector investment needed to generate sustainable jobs for a fast-growing population,” he said.

The north-south corridor, covering 1,800kms, connects the city of Karachi in the south with Torkham on the northern border with Afghanistan, and passes through major production and population centres, including Lahore, Faisalabad and Islamabad.

The economy of the areas served by the corridor accounts for up to 85 per cent of Pakistan’s gross domestic product, and the route is a key link in the Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation Programme’s network of cross-border corridor routes between land-locked Central Asian nations and Pakistan’s warm water ports on the Arabian Sea.

The ADB has been the lead development agency for road development in Pakistan, and together with its development partners, has helped transform the NHA from a bureaucratic government department into a modern service-driven asset management organisation.

Published in Dawn, October 2nd, 2015

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