Towards industrial policy 2.0: Part V

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Infrastructure: Pakistan’s unending energy crisis and high-end user costs have enormously damaged industrial growth and diversification, particularly the export sector.The present model of single buyer-single seller is the root cause of this recurring problem. Unless private-sector firms selected through a transparent competitive process are brought in at the retail stage of distribution of electricity and natural gas and the monopolies of DISCOs are dismantled, the situation will remain precarious. There are very few countries that subsidize piped gas for households and penalize industrial units. Circular debt will keep piling up while the rising costs to the industrial units, particularly those...