After various programs launched to help low income people and support construction industry, the government is going to launch another program “Asaan Karobaar Program” based on regulatory reforms.
The reforms initiative, taken by the government so far, has been branded as Asaan Karobaar Program and a dedicated portal to showcase reforms has been prepared named “business.gov.pk”. The program drafted and planned by the Board of Investment (BoI) is officially being launched at President house on Friday (March 18, 2022).
As per documents available with Profit, all the regulatory reforms initiated and implemented by government and various departments during the past few years would be updated on the portal. Besides a mobile app to share reforms, obtain feedback and reporting of regulatory issues being faced by businesses.
According to the details, the current regulatory environment for businesses in Pakistan consists of 3 tiers of government (Federal, Provincial and local government) and a large number of organizations/ departments have prescribed multiple Registrations/Licenses/Certificates and other permits (RLCO) for establishing & operating such businesses. Many of these RLCOs envisage cumbersome processing through manual application procedures.
While expanding the reforms process across the country by initiating Pakistan Regulatory Reforms Initiative (PRMI), BoI has also started a Regulatory Diagnostic and Elimination Exercise which is a fast-track way of reviewing laws and regulations and removing unnecessary or unwanted laws and regulations, or revising them through a consultative process.
Working Groups were constituted across all regions with nominations of focal persons from all relevant departments. The end product of the PRMI was the development of the Pakistan Business Portal (PBP), a digital repository of business regulations and an access point for applying, renewing and paying for necessary RLCOs.
As per the new program in order to carry out the regulatory guillotine & simplification, BoI has reached out to the private sector through chambers of commerce and industry, sector-specific business associations, and micro businesses. After obtaining the proposals from the private sector, BoI carries out research & analysis on the regulatory instruments to identify reform actions. These are shared with the relevant federal and provincial governments to obtain their response and wherever they agree, implementation mechanisms are devised, and timelines are agreed. In case of disagreement, further discussions are held, including the use of ‘Public Private Dialogue’ techniques. Currently, the third round of developing a regulatory reforms and guillotine action plan is underway to help SME businesses.
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