27th meeting of EDB held
By Asim Hussain

ISLAMABAD—The 27th meeting of Board of Management (BOM) of the Engineering Development Board (EDB) was held here Monday under the chairmanship of Minister for Industries, Production and Special Initiatives, Jahangir Khan Tareen. The Board expressed satisfaction on the performance of EDB. The Minister underlined the importance of competitiveness in industry in order to make in roads in global market. He said that the government would protect the local industry but it also has to improve in order to meet future challenges.
The meeting was informed by Imtiaz Rastgar, CEO that EDB is working on modernization of trucking sector and prepare a report on it. The Board will hold a workshop on trucking sector in January to interact with the stakeholders.
The Minister also briefed the meeting about Pakistan’s participation in international fairs and exhibitions and said that Pakistan has made marks in these and now the European Engineering firms were considering the country as outsourcing destination. He said that the government was taking necessary steps for capacity building of Engineering Development Board as the task given to it was gigantic. He specially mentioned the progress of work done for conversion of Board into a Authority on pattern of Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP). He added that the first draft will be ready by next month and it will be shared with the members of the Board’s so that they could give their inputs.
The meeting was attended by Almas Hyder,CEO, SPEL, M. Imtiaz Ahmed, President, Metro-Hi-tech, Aamir Shirazi, President, Atlas Group, Shakeel Ahmad, Director, United Refrigerator, Tariq Rehman, MD, EMCO Industries Ltd, Mohsin Syed, MD, Hybrid Tech, Shahid M. Khan, Director, Indus Motors, Secretary, Industries, Production and Special Initiatives, Shahab Khawaja, Pervez Butt, Secretary, Ministry of Science and Technology, Dr. Shaukat Hameed Khan, Member, Planning Commission and senior officials of CBR, Ministry of Finance and EDB.