ISLAMABAD:Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has said that the positive indicators including the reduced policy rate and inflation, surged remittances and agricultural exports, and ongoing efforts to boost IT exports evidenced that the government’s economic policies were heading in the right direction.
The prime minister, addressing the young parliamentarians of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, said the two percent policy rate reduction announced on Thursday was a major relief for the industrialists, investors, agriculturalists, and exporters, and expressed the hope for further decrease.
The announcement by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to discuss the $7 billion Extended Fund Facility (EFF) to Pakistan on September 25 was also equally a good development, he added.
The prime minister said that the inflation had reduced to 9.6% from 32% last year, and remittances by expatriates and agricultural exports had witnessed a surge. The government was also striving to promote IT (Information Technology) exports, he said and appreciated the role of Information Minister Attaullah Tarar in amplifying the government’s performance.
But he said many more efforts were yet to be made with unity and a clear mind to regain the lost position.
He told the young parliamentarians including senators and members of the National Assembly (MNAs) that the incumbent government had made a pathway for the country to regain its stature in the comity of nations by rectifying past mistakes.
Prime Minister Shehbazemphasised the role of youth, including parliamentarians, engineers, students, lawyers, bankers and agriculturalists in accomplishing that journey by equipping themselves with modern education and skills, and also assured them of his fullest support in that regard.
He said the IMF programme was also being achieved following the tremendous efforts and tough decisions like putting tax burden on the salaried class, which could be lessened in the future in the form of reduced inflation.
Calling the country’s five million traders to play their part in taxation, he said the government had brought the agro farms under the tax net. Curbing tax evasion was inevitable to rid the country of the IMF programme, he said and prayed that it should be the last such facility.
