ISLAMABAD:
Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb on Sunday framed the IMF’s recent ‘Governance Diagnostic and Corruption Report’ as an opportunity to accelerate institutional reforms, insisting the assessment should be seen as a catalyst rather than criticism of government policies.
At a news conference, he said the government itself had requested and facilitated the inquiry as part of its commitment to transparency, noting that the IMF had recognized progress in taxation, governance, public financial management and procurement.
While many priority reforms were already underway, he added, the remaining recommendations would be made to address structural weaknesses that had persisted for decades. “Institutional reforms remained critical to sustaining Pakistan’s economic turnaround,” he said.
Aurangzeb emphasized that structural reforms without institutional strengthening would remain incomplete. He linked this approach to the government’s wider shift towards a private sector-led, export-led growth model, citing the abolition of the Export Development Allowance as a key example of this policy direction.
“The decision to end the 0.25% levy, along with a review of the governance of the Export Development Fund, reflected the Prime Minister’s directive to place the private sector at the center of economic expansion,” he said. The Cabinet approval summary, he noted, had already been submitted and implementation would begin immediately once approved.
The minister said the latest economic indicators pointed to improved momentum, with cement production up 16%, fertilizer 9%, oil 4%, cars 31% and mobile phone production 26% between July and October.
Major manufacturing, he continued, grew 4.1% year-on-year in the first quarter, reversing last year’s decline. However, he warned that the challenge was to sustain growth without returning to boom-and-bust cycles driven by external pressures.
Aurangzeb reported that exports had grown 5%, while IT services rose more than 20% year-on-year, registering consecutive monthly highs in September and October. He described the $3.5 billion Reko Diq-related syndication — now financially closed — as a transformational investment expected to generate nearly $3 billion in annual exports once production begins.
Remittances, he said, had reached $38 billion last year and were expected to exceed $41 billion this year, strengthening the current account. “Imports were managed under a reformed tariff regime aimed at improving competitiveness by prioritizing raw materials and intermediates, while protectionism was phased out over four to five years.”
