ISLAMABAD: President Asif Ali Zardari on Thursday stressed the need for efforts to boost economic conditions and to address the challenges of gas and power shortage in the country.
He was talking to Federal Minister for Finance Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh, who called on him at the Aiwan-e-Sadr. Finance Secretary Dr Waqar Masood was also present during the meeting.
President Zardari said the improvements in economic indicators were encouraging, however, efforts needed to continue to keep up the pace and momentum of economic turn-around.
He said the prevailing international economic situation was not very encouraging and called for efforts to further stabilize the national economy to fight economic challenges.
The Finance Minister and the Finance Secretary briefed the President about overall economic situation in the country.
Briefing media persons, Spokesperson to the President Farhatullah Babar said the economic managers briefed the President about various aspects of the economy and economic performance during the first five months of the current fiscal year focusing on broadening tax base, fiscal austerity, exports, remittances, imports and inflation.
The Finance Minister said that as a result of difficult economic decisions taken by the present government, the economy was stable and various indicators were showing encouraging signs.
He said the efforts to broaden the tax base had registered a significant success. Up to 16th of December of the current fiscal year, Rs. 712 billion tax had been collected as against Rs. 555 billion collection during the corresponding period last year.
It amounted to an increase of 28 per cent over the corresponding period and exceeded the target of 25 percent.
On austerity measures, the Finance Minister informed the President that various measures adopted by the government had also yielded positive results.
He said the budgetary expenditure during first five months of the year, which was envisaged to be 42 percent, was brought down to 38 percent indicating that the budgetary control measures were successful.
Despite worldwide slump in demand, Pakistani exports during first five months of the current fiscal year have registered an increase of 12 percent over that of the corresponding period last year.
On remittance side, an increase of 18 percent was witnessed with 5.2 billion dollar remittances for the first five months of the current year.
The Finance Minister also informed that by the end of December, the government would have provided a total of Rs 100 billion for developmental projects in the country.
This amount, he said, would be spent on mega projects in energy, communications and water sectors thereby creating jobs and building infrastructure. The energy projects included that of Bhasha Dam and Chashma Power Projects, he informed the President.
The imports during the first five months of the current fiscal year have registered an increase of 20 percent over the corresponding period of last year indicating that the economic activity was gradually picking up and was on steady course, the President was informed.
The President was briefed that inflation has also come down during the first five months of the current fiscal year. The Consumer Price Index (CPI), which was 14 percent in November last year, was 10.2 percent in November this year.
Similarly, the sensitive price index was also witnessing continuously downward trend during past five weeks.
The President was informed that sensitive price index in November this year was 3.77% as against that of over 20% during November last year.
The President inquired about the steps taken for extending social safety net to the poorest of the poor. It was informed that Rs. 20 billion would be provided for the Benazir Income Support Programme by the end of December which would benefit tens of thousands of the poor families living below poverty line.
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