Pakistan Industrial and Trader Associations Front (PIAF) stressed the need for the completion of the joint gas pipeline project with Iran as the issue of energy stands atop Islamabad's priorities.

The pipeline would not only mark a new chapter in the history of Pakistan-Iran bilateral relations but would also help bring dream of industrial revolution into reality, the PIAF Chairman Malik Tahir Javed said in a statement.

He added that completion of the project before 2014 would help overcome energy problems and improve energy supply to the manufacturing and industrial sector.

Such moves would ultimately make the country's industrial units more competitive in the international market, Javed noted.

He said that energy crisis has shattered the industrial structure while millions of industrial workers have lost their jobs. After completion, Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline project would ensure supply of about 750 million cubic feet of gas per day that would bridge the energy gap touching 6000MW and would also save huge foreign exchange spent on import of furnace oil for power generation.

Iran and Pakistan officially inaugurated the construction phase of a gas pipeline project in March which is due to take Iran's rich gas reserves to the energy-hungry South Asian nation.

The project kicked off in a ceremony attended by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his Pakistani counterpart Asif Ali Zardari at the two countries' shared border region in Iran's Southeastern city of Chabahar.

The 2700-kilometer long pipeline was to supply gas for Pakistan and India which are suffering a lack of energy sources, but India has evaded talks. In 2011, Iran and Pakistan declared they would finalize the agreement bilaterally if India continued to be absent in the meeting.

Iran has already constructed more than 900 kilometers of the pipeline on its soil.

According to the project proposal, the pipeline will begin from Iran's Assalouyeh Energy Zone in the South and stretch over 1,100 km through Iran. In Pakistan, it will pass through Baluchistan and Sindh but officials now say the route may be changed if China agrees to the project.

 

News ID 184990