LAHORE: The Pakistan Railways (PR) organised a consultative workshop on ‘Railways Strategic Plan’ with the cooperation of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) team at a local hotel on Saturday.
The workshop was presided over by the Railways Minister Advisor Anjum Pervaiz, and co-chaired by Railways Secretary Parveen Agha. It covered all the aspects of the department like business development, human resource management, rolling stock availability and infrastructure development.
PR CEO Javaid Anwar Boobak said in his opening remarks that the PR was heading towards a new era of reinventing railways in the country.
He said that this is the last opportunity for the railways to formulate an all-inclusive strategy that will define governance frame-work of the future in railways.
ADB Consultant Team Head Sakamoto said on the occasion that the bank had provided international experts to facilitate the PR strategic team.
While giving presentations on different departments of the PR, it was informed to the ADB team that the PR assets had started deteriorating in 1980’s and 90’s due to the lack of investment, thereby resulting in a reduction in number of trains, and the freight operation had nearly halted back in 2012.
Today, freight traffic has increased from only 0.4 million tonnes in 2013 to 5 million tonnes and it would be 8 million tonnes in the next year.
The participants were informed that the PR had already added 55 General Electric locomotives - of 4,000-horse-power – to its fleet and by the year 2025, functional locomotives will increase from 300 to 500.
The workshop was told that the PR was going to receive a massive investment of $8 to 9 billion in the next five years.
The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) PR Team leader Ashfaq Khattak also addressed the participants.
The consultative workshop will be followed by a final workshop planned on Aug 29 and the inputs/ policy decisions by all the stakeholders would be presented to the government for approval.
The workshop was attended by all the principal officers of the Pakistan Railways.