The government has vowed to continue to tread the path of reforms to stabilize the economy and steer it towards the path of sustainable growth.

In a statement today, the Ministry of Finance strongly rejected the assertions made by a prominent economist Atif Mian about Pakistan’s economy, terming them misplaced.

The Ministry of Finance said the country is surviving economically and would continue to survive.

The Ministry pointed out that Pakistan had undertaken deep rooted reforms over the last nine months. These included market exchange rate, interest rate adjustments, midyear taxation to improve fiscal position, imposition of levy on petroleum products and non-monetization of fiscal deficit. All these actions were undertaken under the IMF program. The Ministry of Finance said it is unfortunate that despite such actions, the staff level agreement has still not been reached delaying the release of 9th review tranche.

The Finance Ministry, in its statement, also stated that the current account deficit had been brought down from a high of 17.5 billion dollars to 3.2 billion dollars. This achievement is a reflection of bringing the economy to within its latent strengths and not on borrowed resources.

The Finance Ministry expressed the confidence that there would be a major economic turnaround with political stability likely to emerge soon.

Source: Radio Pakistan