ISLAMABAD:The early harvest projects under China Pakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC) have crated more than 30,000 direct jobs for Pakistanis while themid term and long term projects under CPEC are poised to create hundreds ofthousand employment opportunties in the country.
According to official documents, the figure of employment opportunitiesunder CPEC would further go up as CPEC would generate around 800,000 jobsover the period of next 15 years. Presently, the mega energy projects underCPEC portfolio contributed majority of jobs where 16,000 Pakistanis arehired as laborer and engineers.
Port Qasim Coal Power project is the top one which created jobopportunities for 5,000 Pakistanis. Sahiwal Coal Power Plant Project andZonergy Solar Power Project stand second in list with 3,000 jobs each.“Around 300 to 500 engineers are working on these energy projects whichwill surely help in transfer of knowledge in these sector, thus helping thecountry to have its own trained human resource” said official documents.
With implementation of two more project in energy sector; Sukki Kinari andKarot, would generate around 6,000 jobs for Pakistani engineers andworkers. Huge number of Pakistani civil and electrical engineers could grabthis opportunity where hydropower projects are under execution.
Besides, energy portfolio, CPEC Transport Infrastructure Sector standssecond in creating around 13,000 jobs for locals. The data shows that 9,800Pakistanis are working on Peshawar-Karachi Motorway (Multan SukkurSection), a biggest infrastructure project under CPEC.
The data further shows that KKH Phase II Havelian provided jobs to 2071locals, Orange Line Metro Lahore created employment for 956 people andFiber Optic project created 580 posts for Pakistanis. Development of Freezone project at Gwadar has created 404 direct jobs with additional 2,000indirect employment. It is estimated that this project would createthousands of job opportunities for locals; soon it is made fully functionalwith establishment of different industries here.
Construction work on ML-1 project of Pakistan Railway, Karachi CircularRailway, Gwadar Airport, Eastbay Expressway at Gwadar and other roadprojects are soon to be started as the both sides have agreed in principleto start these projects in 2018. “These projects could further createaround 10,000 to 15,000 direct jobs this year” the data suggested. Thefacts and figure clearly indicated that more than 75 percent Pakistanis areemployed on CPEC projects, a fact which is contrary to the propaganda beingspread by anti CPEC forces.
Besides, such a huge direct employment, the CPEC projects which are inconstruction phase have created thousands of indirect jobs and brought aboom for construction industry as steel and cement manufacturers are fullyengaged in multiplying their production.APP/AFP