6 working groups formed for resource allocation

islamabad — The National Finance Commission (NFC) has decided to form six working groups for distribution of resources among provinces and the Centre which would be coordinated and headed by all provinces and the federal government.

“It has been decided in a meeting that all provinces would be given lead in the working groups whereas the federation would also lead one working group,” Finance Minister Asad Umar told reporters after presiding over the inaugural meeting of NFC here.

The meeting decided that Punjab would lead a working group to make proposals and recommendations on macroeconomic framework and benchmarking, while the federal government would coordinate

the group aimed at vertical distribution of the divisible pool taxes between federation and provinces, including needs of AJ&K and GB.

Similarly, the task for horizontal distribution of divisible pool taxes among provinces would be coordinated by Balochistan.

Measures required to simplify tax procedures and payment systems

to facilitate businesses would be coordinated by Sindh. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would lead the group with the task of integration and merger of Fata in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Asad Umar said that a secretariat would be established in the federal capital where research and other works would be done. The minister said that during the meeting, a detailed list of different tasks and works to be done by the NFC was prepared and it was jointly decided that provinces as well as the federation must have to increase their resources for socio-economic development of the country.

“The NFC is an important platform where big decisions both with respect to economy as well as politics were made, therefore these decisions must have to be done unanimously,” he added.

Meanwhile, according to a statement issued by the finance ministry, Asad Umar said the NFC had been tasked under the constitution with amicable distribution of financial resources among the federation and provinces, and as such its effective role had an important bearing on overall national cohe-