LAHORE: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the government of Punjab have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to jointly promote public-private partnership (PPP) projects in Punjab’s healthcare sector through ADB’s transaction advisory services.
The MOU was signed by the Head of Public-Private Partnership Cell of Planning and Development Board of Punjab Dr Farrukh Naveed and ADB Country Director for Pakistan Xiaohong Yang here on Tuesday. Planning and Development Board Chairman Hamed Yaqoob Sheikh was present on the occasion.
“We are pleased to assist the government of Punjab in developing hospital PPP projects in major cities in order to strengthen health care capacity and improve quality of life for the citizens of Punjab,” said Yang. “It will complement ADB’s ongoing support to the PPP program in Punjab province by creating a pipeline of bankable healthcare PPP projects.”
ADB Head of Public-Private Partnership Yoji Morishita said that ADB’s advisory support for the first hospital PPP project in Punjab will help unlock investments in the sector by creating a model case with the development of template project documents based on international best practices.
“We hope that the first hospital PPP project can be replicated in other cities and accelerates the development of future projects to improve quality and affordability of health care in the province,” he added.
According to the agreement, ADB’s PPP office will screen potential hospital projects in ten major cities in Punjab including Bahawalpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Lahore, Mianwali, Multan, Rawalpindi, Sahiwal, and Sargodha and provide transaction advisory services to identify, prepare, structure and tender the top priority hospital projects to develop PPP’s.
The bank will also provide holistic support in undertaking capacity building and development of a potential project pipeline by mobilising technical assistance funds.
