Gas producers asked to maximise production: Minister
By Khalid Amin

ISLAMABAD—Caretaker Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Ahsanullah Khan Thursday informed the Senate that the gas producers have been asked to maximise their production in order to meet current requirements at the local level. In a written reply to a question raised by Dr. Kauser Firdaus during Question Hour, he said an amount of 50 MMCD additional gas has been diverted from SSGCL to SNGPL due to an unprecedented increase in city loads especially in the domestic sector during winter months.
The Minister said gas load management is done in accordance with the Natural Gas Allocation and Management Policy 2005 approved by the Economic Coordination Committee.
To another question by Ch. Muhammad Anwar Bhinder, he said the total income of OGDCL was 103,876 million rupees against the expenditure of 58,246 million rupees in the financial year 2006-07.
Ahsanullah said an amount of 5,021 million rupees was spent on the OGDCL employees and no grant or aid was received from the federal government during the last fiscal year. He said a total of 2,029 officers (Grade E-I to E-IX) and 9,306 staffers (NMG-I to NMG-16) are working with OGDCL.
Responding to a question by Wali Muhammad Badini, he said currently, there is no proposal under consideration to provide piped natural gas to Noshki in Balochistan. Caretaker Minister for Environment Syed Wajid H. Bukhari while replying to a question by Muhammad Talha Mahmood said the ibex, blue and marco polo sheep are found in mountainous areas of NWFP, Balochistan and the Northern Areas.
He said eighty per cent of the income generated through payment by licensees is shared with the local communities for their social uplift and twenty per cent is retained by the provinces as revenue. Caretaker Minister for Education Dr. Shams K. Lakha, to a question raised by Dr. Javaid Leghari, said the Higher Education Commission (HEC) is only responsible for budget allocation to the public sector universities and degree awarding institutions.
He said HEC has allocated 7,451 million rupees to general universities including Allama Iqbal Open University and Virtually University, adding a total of 306,924 students were enrolled in the public sector universities last year. Caretaker Minister for Labour,Manpower and Overseas Pakistanis Nisar Ghuman, responding to a question by Mrs. Razina Alam Khan, said the unemployed labour force is 2 per cent of the population (all ages) that becomes 6.20 per cent of the labour force.
He said the government is taking steps to maintain high economic growth through higher investment in the agriculture, housing and construction, small and medium enterprises, information technology and telecom sectors. Nisar Ghuman said efforts are also being made to develop private sector and attract foreign direct investment besides making substantial increase in the Public Sector Development Programme.
He said the government is also focusing on development of a database under the project “Labour Market Information System and Analysis” to monitor the labour market that would ultimately provide the guidance for policy formulation.