The federal cabinet on Tuesday approved a national public awareness campaign on conservation of energy, natural gas, water and other resources.
The cabinet meeting, chaired by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, also directed the relevant authorities to formulate a strategy to prevent the recurrence of prolonged power outages in the future.
As part of the nationwide public awareness campaign, international best practices for energy conservation will be integrated into the educational curriculum. The meeting was told that energy conservation efforts would help reduce the petroleum import bill that had doubled in the past seven years.
The meeting was further informed that behavioral changes will not only save valuable foreign exchange but also reduce people’s electricity bills by 30 to 40 percent.
The prime minister, expressing his dismay over the recent power outage across the country, said the inconvenience caused to the people was unacceptable and would not be tolerated in the future and demanded that responsibility for the incident be restored.
The meeting was told that the committee formed by the chief minister on the power outage had started functioning and would submit a report soon.
Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb briefed the cabinet in detail about the National Energy Conservation Awareness and Communication Strategy under which a long-term awareness drive will be launched.
He said the ministry would seek support from print, online and social media, as well as opinion leaders and experts for the effort to be conducted in partnership with public and private agencies.
The awareness will not only benefit the public but also help in reducing the economic burden of the country. The cabinet approved the ministry’s awareness initiative and mandated its early launch and asked other ministries to extend their support.
The cabinet also approved the decisions of the Economic Coordination Committee taken at its meetings on January 3 and 11, 2023, as well as the decisions taken on January 6, 2023 by the Ministerial Committee on the Disposition of Legislative Affairs.