Govt sets average GDP growth rate target of 5.5pc in 5 years: Khusro Bakhtyar

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Planning, Development and Reform Makhdum Khusro Bakhtyar Sudnay said the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government had set the target to maintain average gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate at 5.5% during its five years’ term.

“The economic growth rate will gradually increase to 6.5% in the last year of its tenure,” he said while taking part in the budget debate in the National Assembly.

The minister said the Pakistan People’s Party government (2008-2013) had created some 6.9 million jobs with average GDP rate of 2.8%, and the Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) only 5.7 million jobs despite comparatively higher GDP growth rate of 4.6%.

He, however, questioned the veracity of economic growth rate figures announced by the PML-N government, saying it had deliberately fudged the figures of economic indicators just to show higher growth for its vested interests.

“Under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister Imran Khan, the PTI-led government is determined to create 10 million jobs during its five-year term,” he added.

He said the previous government had recklessly taken debts, increasing the country’s debt to GDP ratio from 64% to 86%.

He said though the petroleum prices in the international market witnessed a record low during the five-year tenure of the PML-N regime, which benefited the country’s economy by over $32 billion but that government took some $34 billion debt.

With the huge fiscal space due to low petroleum prices, the PML-N government could have easily brought the country out of economic crisis, but instead it plunged the economy in to a deep crisis, he added.

He said when the PTI government took over the charge, the current account deficit was at the  highest level of country's history of $20 billion, while the fiscal deficit was also touching the historic high.

The budget deficit, he said, was recorded at Rs 2.3 trillion and the non-budget deficit was Rs 2,000 billion during the previous year.

He said due to the credibility of Prime Minister Imran Khan, Pakistan managed to seek $9.2 billion foreign support in a short span of time.

“We managed to bring down the current deficit from $20 billion to less than $12.5 billion in 10 months.”

Bakhtyar said the PTI government was forced to approach the International Monetary Fund (IMF) only to bridge the current account deficit created by the previous government.

After going to the IMF for 18th time, the nation must resolve and support the government to ensure that this would be the last programme, he added.

The minister said the government had to increase the interest rate to boost national savings which would help enhance business activities in the country.

He said keeping in view the lowest tax to GDP ratio of 11% in the region, the government set an ambitious target of tax revenues of Rs 5.55 trillion which would help increase the debt to GDP ratio.

If the revenue collection target was achieved, Sindh province alone would get additional Rs 200 billion during the upcoming year, which, he hoped, would be judicially spent in all areas of the province.

He said the work on Sukkur-Hyderabad motorway would be initiated during the current year in  partnership with the private sector under the Built-Operate-Transfer (BOT) mode which would help the government save Rs 300 billion from the PSDP allocation.

He said the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project possessed a huge scope and the government could easily achieve the economic growth target by fully focusing on it.

Bakhtyar said the government had set aside record Rs 951 billion under the PSDP 2019-20 and the second most recipient of the development budget was Balochistan, while less developed areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Southern Punjab, and rural Sindh were also given due share.

As regards the development of agriculture sector, the minister said Rs 13 billion had been earmarked while during the previous years’ development budget, the agriculture sector had

got only Rs 1 billion.

Ahsan Iqbal of the PML-N claimed that last year the government had set aside Rs 34 billion for the agriculture sector while the current government had reduced the budget to Rs 5 billion.

Bakhtyar, however, said “I stand by my words that the previous government had allocated Rs 1 billion for the agriculture sector while under the Public Sector Development Programme 2019-20, the PTI government has allocated Rs 12 billion for the sector.”

Speaking on the importance of charter of economy, the minister said it was need of the hour to constitute a committee comprising parliamentarians from all the political parties to set the targets to take the economy to new heights.