Govt to initiate production of renewable energy products

The ministry of science and technology will soon initiate large-scale production and marketing of renewable energy and electronic products in the country and will ensure optimal utilisation of all available resources and promote cost effective indigenous products.

In this regard, STEDEC Technology Commercialisation Corporation of Pakistan, MoST, Pakistan Council for Renewable Energy Technologies (PCRET), National Institute of Electronic (NIE), Telecom Industry of Pakistan (TIP) and ministry of information technology (MoIT) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to design, develop, large-scale production and marketing of renewable energy and electronic products.

Under the MoU, NIE and PCRET will design, develop and produce prototype of demand-driven products and pass on the complete technical know-how to the TIP, while STEDEC will undertake all financial and commercial aspects on behalf of PCRET and NIE.

The TIP will be responsible for mass-scale production and marketing of products designed and developed by NIE and PCRET.

A joint working group having representation of all the four parties as well as of MoST and MoIT will select the products (already designed or to be designed) and prepare workable operational model and SOPs for taking the products from initial stage to marketing level.

Speaking on the occasion of signing ceremony, MoST Secretary Akhlaq Ahmad Tarar said the ministry and its R&D organisations had mandate to serve the national industry through developing products, technologies and processes, import substitutes, value-addition especially for export and by providing technical assistance to SMEs.

The secretary said these R & D organisations had good number of highly qualified, trained and experienced researchers as well as state-of-the-art, well-equipped laboratories for undertaking world class research, however, their contribution to national industrial growth through indigenisation of local technologies has not been very impressive.

He said the reason for this unimposing performance had been weak industrial linkages, trust deficit of industry on public sector organisations, development of non-demand driven products, lack of entrepreneurship development facilities/expertise and so on.

The MoST, while realising these gaps, has established the commercialization cell to develop linkages between R&D organisations, academia and industry for sharing of resources to carry out demand-driven R&D offering solutions to various industrial problems, entrepreneurship development and commercialisation of IP of these organisations, he added.

“I am confident that this MoU will herald a new era of long-term relationship between the two ministries which will be cornerstone of our initiatives aimed at self reliance through indigenisation,” he maintained. The secretary appreciated the efforts of MoST commercialization cell for materialising the MoU to start large-scale production and marketing of indigenous technologies.

MoIT Additional Secretary Muhammad Ejaz Mian also spoke on the occasion and hoped that the MoU will go a long way in large-scale production of renewable energy and electronic products in the country.