<\/p>\n
The caretaker government in a press conference on Tuesday said the reasons behind the caretaker cabinet\u2019s approval of the steep hikes<\/a> in fixed monthly charges and consumer rates for natural gas would help ease the fiscal deficit.<\/p>\n In a press conference, Energy Minister Muhammad Ali stated that for the past decade, Pakistan has been unable to meet the local demand for gas without the help of imports, which had resulted in a significant decrease in Pakistan\u2019s foreign exchange reserves.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause of rising fiscal deficit, we were prone to more borrowing,\u201d he stressed. \u201cThese loans are making us more vulnerable to inflation.\u201d<\/p>\n For the past decade, most of the international companies for natural gas exploration\u2014 except for four \u2014 have left Pakistan because of losses, he said, rendering Pakistan unable to meet its demands without imports.<\/p>\n \u201cIn January 2022 inflation was 13pc and in January 2023, it was 27pc.\u201d<\/p>\n He emphasised \u2014 with the help of bar charts \u2014 the importance of curbing circular debt. \u201cCircular debt has increased to Rs2,100 billion,\u201d he added. \u201cAnd if we did not stop it, it would have gone to Rs2,400 billion.\u201d<\/p>\n The energy minister further broke down how the increment in gas price rates affected different sectors.<\/p>\n He assured that 57pc of the population will not bear the brunt of this hike, as a fixed charge has been put in place to ensure that their bills do not exceed Rs1,300. \u201cThe tariff will increase with consumption. The rich will pay more.\u201d He highlighted this was a \u201cprogressive\u201d hike which will not impact the vulnerable segment of society.<\/p>\n \u201cThe 57pc of the population \u2014 which falls under the protected category \u2014 will not bear the brunt of this hike,\u201d he stated, they will still enjoy a subsidy of 66pc.<\/p>\n Another sector he talked about was fertiliser, he stressed that the local farmers will not be affected by the hike.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have tried to reduce the disparity between the north and south industries,\u201d he underscored that the factories in the north often paid double of those in the south.<\/p>\n \u201cIf anyone wants to set a new factory, they are at a disadvantage of paying more for gas,\u201d he said, \u201cwhich has reduced competition in Pakistan.\u201d<\/p>\n This hike seeks to create a cohesive order where both north and south industries will follow the same gas price rates, which will increase competition and, as a result, employment.<\/p>\n The minister of energy ended the press conference stating that although this hike was necessary, no sudden massive hike will be enforced in the future.<\/p>\n A Rs 384 billion gas subsidy will be introduced for domestic, tandoor, and the fertiliser industry. The minister elaborated that Rs139 billion would be allocated to domestic consumers, Rs45 billion to the fertiliser sector, and Rs200 billion to roti tandoors.<\/p>\n \u201cThe government has completely unchanged the sale price for gas supplies to Roti tandoors because \u201cRoti\u201d is a prime and foremost necessity\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Additional input from APP<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The caretaker government in a press conference on Tuesday said the reasons behind the caretaker cabinet\u2019s approval of the steep hikes in fixed monthly charges and consumer rates for natural gas would help ease the fiscal deficit. In a press conference, Energy Minister Muhammad Ali stated that for the past decade, Pakistan has been unable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/10\/3114323456f5f44.png?r=145710","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-top-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u2018Increasing circular debt\u2019<\/h2>\n
\u2018Will not be a burden on the poor\u2019<\/h2>\n
Subsidy<\/h2>\n