ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Makhdum Khusro Bakhtyar addressed the annual meeting of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) through a video link at the Ministry of Economic Affairs this afternoon, said a press release issued on Tuesday.

The minister appreciated the AIIB for successfully arranging this event during the COVID-19 pandemic. "The pandemic has caused severe disruptions in the global economic system, stress on the health infrastructure and social distress. The impact is more pronounced in case of emerging markets and developing countries. I wish an early end to the pandemic and recovery of the global economy.

In this backdrop, the COVID-19 Crisis Response Facility of [the] AIIB, which was announced to support economies of member countries, is highly commendable," the federal minister said, while addressing the meeting.

The minister said that the AIIB should take the lead in technological and IT-related infrastructure in the short- to medium-term horizon particularly in sectors such as education, health and ICT in post-Covid time. The minister also expressed the hope that the AIIB would enhance climate financing and provision of primary physical infrastructure for cities, water and sanitation, and rural connectivity with the cities for developing countries. The federal minister also mentioned that the development of basic infrastructure in countries within Asia and beyond had remained a priority for the bank.

Because of disruptions due to the pandemic, fiscal space has declined even further with rising domestic spending and exchange rate movements against the US dollar in the Asian countries.

In this situation infrastructure financing could only be sustained by the MDBs including the AIIB; and by leveraging on the PPP potential as we know that building a robust PPP regime remained a challenge for many countries. Similarly, South Asia is the least connected region in the world in terms of trade and tourism; this needs to remain a priority area as bank develops its corporate strategy.-PR

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020