ISLAMABAD: Caretaker Minister for Information and Broadcasting Murtaza Solangi said the caretaker government respects international financial agreements and would continue to implement them in true letter and spirit.
Addressing a news conference after the first session of the two-day meeting of the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC), the minister said deliberations were held on the measures that were essential for reducing the government’s expenditures and circular debt.
He was flanked by Caretaker Minister for Finance Dr Shamshad Akhtar, Minister for Energy Muhammad Ali, and Minister for Industry and Production Gohar Ijaz. Solangi
He said discussions were also held on working out a schedule for implementing the decisions already taken to carry out the privatization of some departments.
He said measures to stop misuse of international agreements, if any, also came under discussion. He said the issue of smuggling of commodities, petroleum products and dollars was discussed at length.
Restructuring of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), measures for removing bottlenecks in foreign direct investment, including visa policy reforms, and steps to improve the performance of different departments were also part of extensive discussions held on the first day of the SIFC meeting.
The minister said traditionally a press release was issued to highlight the decisions and discussions of the SIFC, but from now onward, the caretaker government would inform the public through briefings by the relevant ministers.
He remarked the main objectives of SIFC were to boost foreign direct investment in different sectors including mining, information technology and agriculture.
READ MORE: Govt adopts holistic approach to revive economy: Shamshad
Addressing the press conference, Caretaker Finance Minister Shamshad Akhtar said the interim government needs to revive the economy and it was important to remove import restrictions “across the board” since Pakistan was an import-intensive country.
She said the interim government would go for a rollover of the deposits from other countries upon their maturity. She said the government was fast-tracking discussions with multilateral development banks such as the World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
She also said a review of the International Monetary Fund was due in November, after which the second tranche of its programme with Pakistan was expected, as well as a tranche from the ADB and some loans from the WB.
Akhtar further said the government wanted to revive the economy and was beginning the process to determine the necessary steps to “jumpstart” it.
She added that the interim government was also attempting to enhance the various aspects of the social safety net amid the implementation of a structural adjustment reform programme.
The finance minister said the government was establishing a central monitoring unit for state-owned enterprises (SOEs) that would help ministries strengthen the corporate governance of SOEs and take forward the entities that were ready for privatisation.
