Improving economic & urban planning; and financing investments for growth, job creation, and prosperity
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) has been recovering from the effects of a 30-year conflict in Afghanistan that began with the US-Soviet Union proxy war and eventually evolved into the war on terror. During this time, KP welcomed millions of Afghan refugees and internally displaced people without much federal assistance. These past conflicts, along with occasional natural disasters in the province, drove the transformation of the economy towards services and hindered KP from taking advantage of its location.
Even though some of these challenges have been reduced, there are still several persistent barriers to growth in KP, including a lack of human development, concerns about security, costly energy, and insufficient infrastructure to benefit from regional connectivity initiatives fully. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated these issues by impacting KP’s financial resources.
The Project/what we are doing about this challenge:
The Sustainable Energy and Economic Development (SEED) works closely with the Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (GoKP) to increase public and private investment in the province and improve the efficiency of public investment. SEED has provided high-quality technical assistance to the GoKP and developed evidence-based policy responses based on international best practices to stabilise the GoKP’s fiscal position, protect investments and jobs, and pave the way for a quicker economic recovery. Building on this foundation of well-received technical assistance, comprehensive diagnostic studies, and extensive consultation, SEED is currently supporting the GoKP to plan and finance the climate-smart infrastructure and investment (including green investments) necessary for sustainable growth, employment, and prosperity.
What the project has achieved so far / intends to achieve:
- Supported GoKP in a key yet ambitious reforms to the pension system in KP and achieved an estimated saving of £49 million annually to the provincial exchequer.
- Supported improved design, appraisal and monitoring of publicly funded infrastructure projects through use of technical appraisal checklists in government planning processes and other work – estimated to generate annual savings worth 187 million GBP.
- Provided high-end investment advisory support to pursue public and private finance investments (around $120 million) directly while identifying an investment pipeline worth $4 billion (£3.3 billion) to be pursued by the government, which is heavily centred around clean energy, agriculture, tourism, Infrastructure among other sectors.
- SEED established KP Open Data portal for Bureau of statistics and trained government staff in recording data digitally on all key economic sectors, thereby enhancing data provision and access for all stakeholders including the public, for evidence-based policy planning.
- By the end of the program, SEED is on track to over achieve its goal of facilitating more than $150 million investments for KP.
Notification and operationalisation of Pakistan’s first Behavioral Insights Unit, MindLab in partnership with Qatar’s B4Development.
