LAHORE: An interactive session on ‘Ease of Doing Business in Punjab’ was held on Saturday in which World Bank experts and the representatives of the Punjab government shed light on Punjab’s ease of doing business reforms initiatives. The session was moderated by Planning and Development Secretary Iftikhar Ali Sahoo. World Bank Representative and senior economist Amjad Bashir and Punjab government representative from the Planning and Development Ali Jalal gave detailed presentation on ‘Ease of Doing Business and Doing Business Report’ and ‘100 Day Reform Initiative – Punjab Government Action Plan’, respectively. They said that simplifying business procedures through policy reform is indispensable if the investment environment in a county is to be accelerated. Cumbersome business regulatory structures get in the way of ideas becoming viable businesses, generating revenue and employment. As part of implementation of the 100 days reform action plan on doing business to improve business environment in the province, the Punjab govt’s Planning and Development Department is leading a comprehensive doing business reform agenda. This is done in collaboration with multiple provincial departments and agencies to help entrepreneurs with a host of operations required to start a business. More importantly, the private sector has been engaged throughout the conception and implementation phase of these reform initiatives. To bolster Pakistan’s ranking on the business registration index, the Punjab government has a business registration portal to register selective business entitles online. This helps do away with the encumbrance of feeding almost same information on portals of Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) for company incorporation, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) for tax registrations and employees Old-Age Benefits Intuitions (EOBI) for social security, resulting in duplication of information, waste of time wastage and decline in doing business ranking. Moreover, this ends the need on part of entrepreneurs to visit government offices or banks for that matter. Up till now around 1500 entities have been established through this online facility. In coming months’ businesspersons should be able to pay the business registration fee online, further reducing time and cost. Speakers further said that as for reforms to ease the property registration process, it now takes only 18 days to register property in Lahore through reduction in procedures. In addition, Land Record Management and information System has automated approximately 55 million land properties thus making it possible for the land owners to access their property details online. Transparency of information is ensured through provision of a list of documents, procedures, digitized property maps of rural and peri-urban land, and fee/tax calculator on the website of the Punjab land record Authority. Collaboration between relevant public departments is key to facilitate issuance of building permits. The number of days in which one could be obtained has been reduced from 60 earlier to 21 now. This became possible through collaboration between the Metropolitan Corporation Lahore and Punjab Information Technology Board that have recently started the facility for issuing building permits from the e-Khidmat Centre in Town Hall. In its’ efforts to facilitate the issuance of building permits, the by-laws of Lahore Development Authority and MCL have been standardized, moving a step closer towards one city one system. Collaboration between LDA and Traffic Engineering and Transport planning Agency and Water and Sanitation Agency has seen the setting up of one-window counters at LFA’s office for issuance of building permits within 20 days for same categories. This is considered as sample case study under Doing Business. Projects that do not have any significant environmental impact do not require environmental approval now to obtain permit. These include warehouses for storage of non-hazardous materials and having no temperature control system or facility, education institutions with area up to four Kanal except medical colleges, universities and research institutes and cottage industry units of various types with project cost of less than Rs 10 million, unless otherwise specified by the agency. Meanwhile during shed light on Doing Business report said that under the contract enforcement indicator also measures alternative dispute resolution index. On this front, efforts were made to promote a culture of alternate dispute resolution mechanism for speedy dispensation of justice and reducing excessive burden on the courts. Speakers told that, under this intuitive, three medication centers were established in District Court Lahore. These medication centers deal with a verity of cases including criminal, civil, family, guardian, rent and appeals etc. The idea was such a huge success that now the medication centers are functional in all districts of the Punjab. Till now around 10, 637 cases have been processed through these mediation centers out of which 6812 cases have been resolved. In coming months, a state of the art Alternate Dispute Resolution Centre in Lahore which is nearing completion will also be made functional. There are many other reform initiatives under process, aimed at improving Pakistan’s doing business ranking next year. Once these reforms are implemented successfully in Lahore district, the scale may be increased to replicate these success stories to other parts of the districts. The government of Punjab is also working with the province of Sindh on Doing Business reforms so that the national ranking may be improved, they said. Published in Daily Times, January 14th 2018.