Pakistan: The other side.

[Kaptaan]

The media paints a very negative image of Pakistan. Various international institutions churn out numbers and draw a poor and bankrupt country. While it is true the country has had problems but the reality is far better than what you hear about Pakistan. The problem in Pakistan is a broken down tax system that has failed to document the economy. In fact in a country of 200 million people only 1 million are registered as tax payers. Not all of them are paying taxes. Thus the figures you hear about are based on this 'visible' portion of the economy. But beyond that there is vast informal economy which relies on cash transactions and no records.

To underline this aspect of Pakistan I want to show two sectors here. The informal economy may not be paying taxes, may not be recorded but real money is made by people. When people make money they usually spend it. In Pakistan buying a house is top on the list followed by cars. First I will cover the real estate sector.

In most cities and towns of Pakistan huge housing projects are mushrooming. The larger ones can often be designed for million inhabitants and cover many square miles. They are changing the entire geography of cities in Pakistan. The speed at which they are spreading is amazing. The largest developer is the multi billion dollar Bahria company which often falls foul of the law for using strong arm tactics to grab land because of it's need to spread out more.

These estates are often of the highest standard with houses ranging from £100k to £1 million. The crazy thing is demand exceeds supply which is why these estates keep need to gobble up more land to build more houses. This just tells us the scale of the informal economy in Pakistan. These estates have the trypical shopping plazas, mosques, parks, golf courses etc designed into the scheme.

I begin here with Bahria Town in Islamabad. These developments are so large and spreading out so fast that you can even see them on Google Earth. Again let me make clear these are not just little pockets but huge areas of cities some designed with 1 million plus populations.

 

[Kaptaan]

Bahria Karachi designed for million plus. This being Pakistan all the Bahria developments across Pakistan have clones of Eiffel Tower, Egyptian iconography etc. As this is in Sindh trhe climate is semi-desert and water is piped from the Indus River.

NOTE: These are being developed by private companies without any government funding. The developer sells the plots/houses/apartments and gets his investment back

 

[Kaptaan]

Back to Islamabad. - Blue World City. I actually am thinking of buying a apartment here. It is going to be between this which is being built in conjunction with some Turkish company and has Turkish flavour to it and Eighteen which is being built by a Egyptian company near Islamabad Airport. This project was inaugerated by Turkish actors from the Ertugrul series.

 

[Kaptaan]

Eighteen Islamabad.

 

[mulj]

Exellent news, construction bussiness is one of the best ways to return undocumented money into legal folds, not ideal and has its flows but still one of the better instruments .
Your goverment needs every penny to continue started projects and reforms, so this construction boom is more then welcomed, also this kind of housing projects will reshape psihology and social tissue of residents towards more sofisticated needs which is even better effect then pured money into economy.

 

[Kaptaan]

All these private huge housing projects ignore the poor. So like in Western Europe Pakistan government under PM Imran Khan have take up the responsibility to provide cheap housing for the poor ar prices as low as £2,500 which will be funded by government backed loans at very low rates. The idea is instead of the poor paying rents for sub-par living accomodation they get modern apartments or houses at prices they can afford.

This is a huge and signature project of PM Imran Khan. The idea is to boost the economy, give employment and provide cheap housing to the poor. The properties offered range from small apartments to small houses and other sizes in the middle bracket.

The project is called 'NAYA PAKISTAN HOUSING" or New Pakistan Housing". Few months ago the keys to the first units to over 1,500 lucky families were handed over in Islamabad. The plan is to build 5 million units in the first phase in all cities and towns of Pakistan.

These are all social housing for the working class and poor segement of society.