News: CSF to draw up terms of reference after detailed study
Name of the Newspaper: The Business Recorder
Date of publication: Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Karachi: Competitiveness Support Fund (CSF) will undertake some viability study to draw up terms of references on the basis of stock taking of underlying facts and interests into the usefulness of an arbitration centre in Pakistan.

The CSF was established by the Government of Pakistan and is supported by the USAID. The Government of Pakistan will provide 10 million dollars, the USAID has already provided 10 million dollars and the European Union (EU) has committee to provide 10 million dollars.

According to an official document, the world Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report emphasizing the inefficient judicial system which does not allow transparent and low-cost settlement of disputes as one of the main obstetrical for the improving the competitiveness of the economy.

This component of the CSF will help to improve the regulatory framework, including the intellectual property rights protection, insolvency and company law. Creating new arbitration facilities is in many instances an effective approach towards enhancing a country's competitiveness in attracting foreign and mobilizing domestic private investment strengthening commercial arbitration is the therefore one of the important component of the CSF.

Commercial arbitration's is a dispute resolution mechanism providing an alternative to reducing the case load of local courts. In many cases, it is preferred by investors over courts as it is perceived to be faster, more neutral (i.e. more business then politically oriented) and as its proceedings are usually non-public so that business confidentiality may be better safeguarded.

The effective and rapid protection of the property contractual rights is essential to investors, both foreign and domestic.

The principal outcome of the CSF is to promote the knowledge based enterprise start-ups, increase the productivity of the country's enterprises, enhance the quality of the service, create new and better job opportunities and reinforce innovation to drive economic growth.

The idea behind this new initiative will help raise Pakistan overall global competitiveness ranking from 83 in 2005 among 117 countries to targeted 60 percentile by 2010 with the creation of a more knowledge based innovative economy and higher productivity.