KABUL (Pajhwok): Industrialists on Thursday called the commencement of the TAPI gas pipeline project “a big achievement” and asked the government to extend the gas to residential homes and industrial parks.
Leaders from Afghanistan converged in the remote Karakum desert about 300km northeast of the Turkmenistan capital Ashgabat and launched the 1,814km Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, named after the countries it is designed to cross.
A 750km portion of the pipeline will pass through Afghanistan’s Herat, Farah, Helmand and Kandahar provinces reaching Pakistan.
Afghanistan would earn $400 million annually in transit fee and the project would create jobs for thousands of people in the country. The project would be completed in the next four years (by 2019).
Mines Ministry officials say Afghanistan would purchase 500 million cubic metre of gas in the first decade, 1 billion in the second and 1.5 billion in the third decade.
Members of Afghanistan Industrialists Association (AIA) told a press conference in Kabul they wished timely completion of the TAPI project because Afghanistan lacked enough liquefied gas to facilitate industrialists.
“The Afghan government should extent the facility to industrial parks in Kabul and provinces and residential areas,” AIA chairman Sakhi Ahmad Paiman said.
He said becoming member of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) was another achievement for Afghanistan. “As our industries are newly established, we are struggling with some problems. Regional countries give subsidies to traders and provide them modern technology.”
myn/ma
