Dar shocks gas consumers with big hikes

[RIP Pak LAW]

ISLAMABAD: The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet on Monday increased natural gas prices in the range of 16 per cent to 112.32pc with retrospective effect from Jan 1 for six months in a bid to raise an additional Rs310 billion from the majority of domestic and all other categories of consumers to secure early disbursement of $1.2 billion tranche.

The ECC meeting chaired by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar also introduced the concept of protected consumers for a period of four months —November to February — whose average per month consumption will be below 0.9 hm3 (90 units). Four slabs for protected and six slabs for non-protected consumers were also introduced.

The minimum slab for residential consumers before the increase was 50 units per month (0.5 hm3), which under the new price mechanism was reduced to 25 units. This means consumers with low consumption would be hit under the new price mechanism to collect maximum revenue from the bulk of domestic users.

A fixed rate of Rs50 per month from protected consumers and Rs500 from non-protected consumers will be collected in addition to the increase in gas prices. The fixed-rate collection, according to the government, is justified to reduce the impact of higher bills due to increased gas consumption in winter.

New tariffs will be effective from Jan 1

Former Prime Minister Shahid Haqqan Abbasi also attended the ECC meeting along with other regular ministers. Commerce Minister Naveed Qamar, Power Minister Khurram Dastgir and Minister of State for Finance and Revenue Dr Aisha Ghous Pasha among others attended the meeting.

The hike in gas tariff for industries, a major source of electricity generation, will push up the cost of production. The industrial sector will then pass on this increase to end-consumers. As a result, inflation will further increase in the months to come.

The government has also increased gas prices for K-Electric, Sindh Noordiabad and Engro Powergen Qadirpur at a rate of 22.5pc to Rs1,050 from Rs1,187 per mmBtu, while an increase of 103.72pc to Rs2,406 from Rs1,181 was made for Liberty Power and 19.65pc to Rs140 from Rs117 per mmBtu was made for Engro Fertiliser Ltd. The gas rate for cement sector was increased by 17.46pc to Rs1,500 from Rs1,023.

On Jan 10, the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) has already allowed two gas companies — Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Ltd (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company Ltd (SSGCL) — to hike their prices by 74.42pc and 75.35pc, respectively. However, it was subject to the approval of the ECC.

BISP

The ECC approved Rs40bn as a technical supplementary grant to Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) to meet its budgetary requirements for an increase in the unconditional and conditional grants.

Of these, an amount of Rs12bn for Benazir Kafaalat—unconditional cash transfer covering 9 million families while another Rs22bn for disbursement of cash assistance to affectees of floods as emergency relief.

Another Rs3.720bn will be disbursed for Benazir Taleemi Wazaif, Rs1.880bn for the nutritional programme and Rs400m for the direct cost of cash transfer.

Debt rescheduling

The ECC allowed the secretary Economic Affairs Division to sign a debt rescheduling agreement for $14.53 million with Russia -- $11.73m (principal) and $2.80m (interest). This debt relief was announced in April 2020 for IDA-eligible countries to mitigate the socioeconomic impact of Covid-19.

So far, 37 debt suspension agreements with 15 creditor countries have been signed.

Published in Dawn, February 14th, 2023
----

Dar shocks gas consumers with big hikes

New tariffs will be effective from Jan 1.

www.dawn.com

----
Meanwhile 'neutrals' are busy in fooling awaam with such songs and slogan:

Hum Zinda Qaum Hain
Painda Qaum Hain
Hum Sub Ki Hai Pehchaan
Hum Sub Ka Nahi, sirf neutrals ka Pakistan, Pakistan,Pakistan

 

[Riz]

Mashallah

 

[RIP Pak LAW]

Dar rocks, awaam shocks

 

[NooriNuth]

ISLAMABAD: The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet on Monday increased natural gas prices in the range of 16 per cent to 112.32pc with retrospective effect from Jan 1 for six months in a bid to raise an additional Rs310 billion from the majority of domestic and all other categories of consumers to secure early disbursement of $1.2 billion tranche.

The ECC meeting chaired by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar also introduced the concept of protected consumers for a period of four months —November to February — whose average per month consumption will be below 0.9 hm3 (90 units). Four slabs for protected and six slabs for non-protected consumers were also introduced.

The minimum slab for residential consumers before the increase was 50 units per month (0.5 hm3), which under the new price mechanism was reduced to 25 units. This means consumers with low consumption would be hit under the new price mechanism to collect maximum revenue from the bulk of domestic users.

A fixed rate of Rs50 per month from protected consumers and Rs500 from non-protected consumers will be collected in addition to the increase in gas prices. The fixed-rate collection, according to the government, is justified to reduce the impact of higher bills due to increased gas consumption in winter.



Former Prime Minister Shahid Haqqan Abbasi also attended the ECC meeting along with other regular ministers. Commerce Minister Naveed Qamar, Power Minister Khurram Dastgir and Minister of State for Finance and Revenue Dr Aisha Ghous Pasha among others attended the meeting.

The hike in gas tariff for industries, a major source of electricity generation, will push up the cost of production. The industrial sector will then pass on this increase to end-consumers. As a result, inflation will further increase in the months to come.

The government has also increased gas prices for K-Electric, Sindh Noordiabad and Engro Powergen Qadirpur at a rate of 22.5pc to Rs1,050 from Rs1,187 per mmBtu, while an increase of 103.72pc to Rs2,406 from Rs1,181 was made for Liberty Power and 19.65pc to Rs140 from Rs117 per mmBtu was made for Engro Fertiliser Ltd. The gas rate for cement sector was increased by 17.46pc to Rs1,500 from Rs1,023.

On Jan 10, the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) has already allowed two gas companies — Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Ltd (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company Ltd (SSGCL) — to hike their prices by 74.42pc and 75.35pc, respectively. However, it was subject to the approval of the ECC.

BISP

The ECC approved Rs40bn as a technical supplementary grant to Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) to meet its budgetary requirements for an increase in the unconditional and conditional grants.

Of these, an amount of Rs12bn for Benazir Kafaalat—unconditional cash transfer covering 9 million families while another Rs22bn for disbursement of cash assistance to affectees of floods as emergency relief.

Another Rs3.720bn will be disbursed for Benazir Taleemi Wazaif, Rs1.880bn for the nutritional programme and Rs400m for the direct cost of cash transfer.

Debt rescheduling

The ECC allowed the secretary Economic Affairs Division to sign a debt rescheduling agreement for $14.53 million with Russia -- $11.73m (principal) and $2.80m (interest). This debt relief was announced in April 2020 for IDA-eligible countries to mitigate the socioeconomic impact of Covid-19.

So far, 37 debt suspension agreements with 15 creditor countries have been signed.

Published in Dawn, February 14th, 2023
----

Dar shocks gas consumers with big hikes

New tariffs will be effective from Jan 1.

www.dawn.com

----
Meanwhile 'neutrals' are busy in fooling awaam with such songs and slogan:

Hum Zinda Qaum Hain
Painda Qaum Hain
Hum Sub Ki Hai Pehchaan
Hum Sub Ka Nahi, sirf neutrals ka Pakistan, Pakistan,Pakistan

Not to mention that IK government was ousted by judiciary not military

 

[TNT]

Hor choopo boots

 

[SoulSpokesman]

PKR depreciation, fuel and power hikes while painful in the short run are steps in the right direction and suggest that the Imported govt is taking a long-term view.

Having said that ideally all these tough steps and compliance with IMF terms should be taken by a govt which enjoys popular legitimacy, which this govt clearly doesnt enjoy.

Regards

 

[Fasbre2]

Not to mention that IK government was ousted by judiciary not military

Correction…Judiciary having a gun pointed to the head and/or briefcase full of notes…

 

[Olympus81]

Honestly, Dar is a bastard, but I won’t condemn this move.

With local gas depleting, no new discoveries, importing gas, the price of which has increased considerably, (coupled with the fact that our risk management department is sleeping), this move was needed. Simple economics.

There are other factors such as a depreciating Rs that has caused this for which we can curse Dar.

I would suggest another 25% hike. If you want to get burnt, do it once and get it over with. Pakistani awaam will forget in day or two.

 

[Skull and Bones]

PKR depreciation, fuel and power hikes while painful in the short run are steps in the right direction and suggest that the Imported govt is taking a long-term view.

Having said that ideally all these tough steps and compliance with IMF terms should be taken by a govt which enjoys popular legitimacy, which this govt clearly doesnt enjoy.

Regards

Dada, the nation as a whole never did a day’s honest work to feed its people. Antibiotics will be painful in the short term.

 

[Olympus81]

Dada, the nation as a whole never did a day’s honest work to feed its people. Antibiotics will be painful in the short term.

Dude enough of your hyperbole and jingoism. Understand that you are the neighbor from the East.

The public is working hard and the fact that people are not rioting means they still have something in their reserves, at least most of them.

 

[Skull and Bones]

Dude enough of your hyperbole and jingoism. Understand that you are the neighbor from the East.

The public is working hard and the fact that people are not rioting means they still have something in their reserves, at least most of them.

Here I am referring to the state and establishment , not hard working common folks.

 

[alphapak]

 

[Dalit]

Embrace yourselves. This is not even the tip of the iceberg. What IMF is about to impose through PDM would crush the poor man.

 

[Burger_King]

Let's say your car has a brake problem and you give it to a neighboring mistry to fix it. Mistry takes your money but does f'all. You pick up the car and drive to work but meet accident on the way because of brake failure. Car gets fixed due to insurance but two years later, break problem arises again. You take the car to same mistry.

Below is a story from Dawn from exactly twenty years back:

DAWN WIRE SERVICE : 14 February 1998 Issue : 04/07

asianstudies.github.io

IMF to suggest increase in utility charges
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Ikram Hoti

ISLAMABAD Feb 9: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has started
the first round of scanning the record of government receipts from
public utility services. The IMF has undertaken the study to
assessing the potential exercised during the first half of financial
year 1997-98, and to suggest the volume of increase in utility
service charges in Pakistan during the current fiscal....
------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the the twenty five years, world has changed beyond recognition. I did not even have an email address back then even though I was a recent graduate out of leading state university in the US. At best, only few thousand people had access to internet in Pakistan back then. I remember getting internet access around that time in Karachi through cybernet through 14.4 kb/s modem. Access cost around PKR 100/hour and I logged on may be for an hour a day.

Twenty five years ago Pakistan's total exports amounted to around USD10bn p.a. while Vietnam exported goods worth around USD 12bn p.a. Today, Pakistan's exports stand at around USD 25-27bn while Vietnam exports goods worth around USD 340 bn.

I have been aware of Sharifs since I was a little boy who used to play maarun peetee during break time. Sharifs have controlled Punjab pretty for around 30 of the last 40 years. Yet English the media describes Shebaz Sharif as an efficient administrator who gets work done at Shebaz speed.

Even without the internet or 24/7 news channels, I could tell even back then that ruling class and their western enablers were making chutiyas out of Pakistanis. I cut my losses and beat a hasty retreat out of Pak. World was different back then so there were lots of opportunities for people like myself. But only skill that will be suitable for younger generation now is guerilla warfare.

 

[Dalit]

Let's say your car has a brake problem and you give it to a neighboring mistry to fix it. Mistry takes your money but does f'all. You pick up the car and drive to work but meet accident on the way because of brake failure. Car gets fixed due to insurance but two years later, break problem arises again. You take the car to same mistry.

Below is a story from Dawn from exactly twenty years back:

DAWN WIRE SERVICE : 14 February 1998 Issue : 04/07

asianstudies.github.io

IMF to suggest increase in utility charges
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Ikram Hoti

ISLAMABAD Feb 9: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has started
the first round of scanning the record of government receipts from
public utility services. The IMF has undertaken the study to
assessing the potential exercised during the first half of financial
year 1997-98, and to suggest the volume of increase in utility
service charges in Pakistan during the current fiscal....
------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the the twenty five years, world has changed beyond recognition. I did not even have an email address back then even though I was a recent graduate out of leading state university in the US. At best, only few thousand people had access to internet in Pakistan back then. I remember getting internet access around that time in Karachi through cybernet through 14.4 kb/s modem. Access cost around PKR 100/hour and I logged on may be for an hour a day.

Twenty five years ago Pakistan's total exports amounted to around USD10bn p.a. while Vietnam exported goods worth around USD 12bn p.a. Today, Pakistan's exports stand at around USD 25-27bn while Vietnam exports goods worth around USD 340 bn.

I have been aware of Sharifs since I was a little boy who used to play maarun peetee during break time. Sharifs have controlled Punjab pretty for around 30 of the last 40 years. Yet English the media describes Shebaz Sharif as an efficient administrator who gets work done at Shebaz speed.

Even without the internet or 24/7 news channels, I could tell even back then that ruling class and their western enablers were making chutiyas out of Pakistanis. I cut my losses and beat a hasty retreat out of Pak. World was different back then so there were lots of opportunities for people like myself. But only skill that will be suitable for younger generation now is guerilla warfare.

Notice how the Pakistani mainstream media is silent on the economic mismanagement of the Sharif family.