JW Forland keen to set up bus assembly in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: JW Forland anxiously waits for Pakistan’s electric vehicle policy before it sets up an electric bus manufacturing facility in the country, General Manager Oversees Gary Gao has said in a meeting with Prime Minister’s Adviser on Climate Change Malik Amin Aslam.

A delegation of JW Forland, manufactures of Foton vehicles, and Daewoo Pakistan visited the Ministry of Climate Change the other day and expressed their willingness to set up an electric bus manufacturing facility in Pakistan.

Federal Minister for Climate Change Malik Amin Aslam said the government was planning to set up a Special Economic Zone in Attock, exclusive for electric vehicles, with the help of Pakistan Air Force.

There were plenty of skilled to semi-skilled workers in Kamra, the proposed site for the SEZ. Electric vehicles would not only reduce environmental pollution, but also cut Pakistan’s energy import bill.

Currently Pakistan has more electricity supply than demand, while government is paying to the power producers in terms of capacity. This makes the situation conducive for electrical vehicles.

Ministry of Climate Change has negotiated the installation of electrical changing infrastructure with oil marketing companies and the response was very encouraging, the minister said.

The Chinese delegation said that EV market was new in the world and they were happy that Pakistan’s government was eager to harvest its fruits. JW Forland expressed their desire to set up an assembly for electric vehicles especially buses that they were interested to run in urban areas of Pakistan with the help of Daewoo Pakistan.

Both companies will submit their proposal to the Ministry of Climate Change, which was finalising EV policy, in a couple of weeks. However, they expected out of the box support from the government keeping in view the fact that EV buses were not commercially viable without government support. Delegation told that more than 80 percent of the urban bus system in Beijing comprised of EV buses and that Chinese government had to provide heavy subsidy/ support for that. They also requested the minister to speak to Sindh governor for the introduction of electric buses for green line metro project of Karachi, which was solely funded by the federal government.

Daewoo Pakistan CEO Shaheryar Chisty said his company was ready to invest in EV, but the government would have to support extraordinarily as technology was not cheap.

The minister said he would speak to his government and they were considering Islamabad and Lahore for that purpose. “Lahore was facing a severe problem of environmental pollution, while Islamabad was small and a manageable city,” he added.

Visit of the delegation came subsequent to the prime minister’s visit to China, where he also went to JW’s manufacturing plant in Beijing and invited the company to set up a similar facility in Pakistan.