Minister for Finance and Revenue Shaukat Tareen has said that the government is taking all possible measures to control inflation, increase revenue and growth rate, saying that Pakistan will not opt-out of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) deal.
While talking to a private media channel, Tareen said, the government was extensively working in the agriculture, housing and technology sectors to elevate the life of the common man.
“We will incentivise the public sector development spending, agriculture, industry, housing and construction sectors to achieve economic growth. The two things that have been missing during the PTI’s rule. Despite booking over 8 per cent of the GDP budget deficit every year, the government has very little space left for development spending, thanks to wrong policies of the central bank that are eating up 60 per cent of the FBR’s revenue in interest cost.”
The minister said budget 2021-22 would be announced by next month. The government is pursuing a policy to take the economy towards growth mode, he added.
Moving forward, 12 working groups have been consulted in the Economic Advisory Council (EAC) which will devise short, medium and long-term strategies for different sectors.
One of our key focuses is to keep a check on inflation and reduce it to provide relief to the public. He also pointed out that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has done good work in the recent year but more needs to be done.
He assured that Pakistan is not coming out of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) program but will ask for some relief considering the COVID-19 situation in the country. “I already had some fruitful discussions regarding this with the IMF and World Bank,” he added.
