Peace Pipeline or Pipedream?
The proposed US$7 billion Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) 2720 km gas “peace pipeline” project is expected to take three to five years to complete. While Pakistan’s demand for gas will expand significantly over the next two decades, India’s need is far more. Presently using 100 million cubic metres per day, this will double in the next 7-8 years. With decline in its reserves India estimates using 400 million cubic meters of gas per day by 2025, almost four times more than in 2005. Having the world’s second largest gas reserve, Iran is the most geographically convenient supplier of gas to both Pakistan and India.
Pakistan’s “Gold Coast”
If any other country in the world had the type of coast that Pakistan has, long stretches of virgin beaches with vast empty spaces hinterland, it would have been commercially exploited to the limit by now. But Pakistani planners being what they are, more akin to a mule with blinders, their focus has been more or less along the Indus Valley, with only lip-service attention to other areas. Whereas in the early days of the country it made sense, for a country with one seaport serving a population of 130 million (not counting the hundreds of millions in countries beyond) it is imperative to have alternatives. Furthermore domestic population congestion and economic factors because of the emerging markets of Central Asia require that a new sea-land dimension along a different axis be added for expansion or otherwise all facilities and opportunities are likely to be clogged and choked up.