China to provide $1 billion grant to Pakistan for socio-economic development

China has made huge investments in Pakistan in the energy sector under the US $60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor initiative and Beijing will provide US $1 billion grant to Islamabad for the socio-economic development in the country, a minister said Friday.

Addressing a seminar by the CPEC Forum in Islamabad, Minister for Planning and Development Khusro Bakhtiar said industrial and agricultural development will be targeted in the next phase of CPEC.

"Cooperation in education, health, water, poverty alleviation and other sectors has been included in socio-economic development," Bakhtiar said at the seminar titled Regional Cooperation and Industrial Development through Business to Business Cooperation.

He urged the private sector to take a lead in the industrial development, asserting that cooperation in the industrial sector will further strengthen relationship between Pakistan and China.

China will provide US $1 billion grant to Pakistan for the socio-economic development, he said.

China has made huge investments in the energy sector under the CPEC which was launched in 2015 when President Xi Jinping visited the country, he added.

Bakhtiar said China had offered free access for export of 313 Pakistani items and a Pakistan-China Business Forum is being set up to promote trade between the two countries.

The CPEC Forum provides platform for exchange of ideas on the CPEC, and the latest event was a collaboration between Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad, Pakistan China Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and Research and Development International.

The CPEC, which connects Gwadar Port in Balochistan with China's Xinjiang province, is the flagship project of Chinese President Xi's ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

India has been boycotting the BRI to protest over the CPEC being laid through the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.