Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) have long been advocated by economists as a means to supplement the governments’ inadequate (federal and provincial) resources to meet major deficiencies in physical and social infrastructure.

In Pakistan, the problem is exacerbated by massive curtailment of the very limited budgeted allocation earmarked for Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) at the end of the year as and when the deficit reaches unsustainable levels – a situation prevailing in the country for the past decade.

Reports suggest that between 1990 and 2019 there were 108 financially closed PPP projects with a total investment of 28.4 billion dollars. In 2021, parliament approved an amendment to the 2017 PPP law and established a Public Private Partnership Authority (PPPA), with all four provinces setting up a corresponding provincial authority, designed to streamline the approval process and provide policy guidelines for developing and implementing PPPs in three modes: Build-Operate-Transfer, Build-Own-Operate-Transfer or Design-Build-Finance-Operate-Transfer (DBFOT).

The selection of PPP rests with the government (federal or provincial) hence there is a political bias which explains why the bulk of the PPPs in Punjab focused on roads/flyovers (reflecting the priority accorded to this sector by the Sharif-led administrations) though projects in the pipeline are more diverse, perhaps reflecting Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz’s different priorities from those of her predecessors. These include student accommodation in public sector universities and colleges, 500-bed tertiary care hospital, establishment of time travel park, Lahore, foot and mouth disease vaccine production plant (Lahore) and agricultural production markets in various districts of Punjab.

READ MORE: Development 2.0: the case for PPPs in Pakistan

Sindh’s PPPs have been in multiple sectors including Thar water........

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