Uraan Pakistan, an initiative by the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz)-led government, was launched amidst much fanfare in the presence of representatives from all three national parties on 31 December 2024.
A copy of the programme published on expensive art paper with the title Uraan Pakistan: Homegrown National Economic Plan (2024-29) was held by a smiling Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif flanked by four PML-N federal ministers - Ahsan Iqbal the architect of the programme, Khawaja Asif, Mohammad Aurangzeb, and Ishaq Dar.
Anwaarul Haq, AJK Prime Minister affiliated with the PML-N, and Chief Minister Punjab Maryam Nawaz were also present; as were three PPP stalwarts namely Faisal Karim Kundi, Governor Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Nasir Hussain Shah, Sindh Local Government Minister, and Sheikh Jaafar Khan Mandokhel, Balochistan Governor.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf was represented by Muzzammil Aslam, Advisor to the Chief Minister KPK standing on the far right of the Prime Minister.
At the outset one can challenge the title’s claim of homegrown as later in the document it refers to the national productivity master plan which it maintains “has been developed with the assistance of Asian Productivity Organisation and Korean Development Institute.” Another rather glaring uninformed assumption of the document is its contention that in the “last few decades we have seen the rise in globalisation with manufacturing moving to developing countries.”
This may indicate a dated mind-set as there is overwhelming evidence in international relations literature as well as ongoing world events, that over the past few decades, globalisation is under severe threat - defined as free flow of capital, goods and peoples.
The reason: the world is inexorably moving towards multipolarity from the unipolar US-led world mainly due to crippling Western sanctions.
Uraan Pakistan spans the five-year tenure of the government (2024-29), unlike Ahsan Iqbal’s Vision 2025 that was launched in 2013 and envisioned a period seven years more than the end of the tenure of the then government.
Formulating five-year plans is an exercise that dates back to 1955 when the first five-year plan was formulated with the appropriate Ministry, then referred to as Planning and Development renamed more flamboyantly about a decade ago as Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, taking the lead role.
The last five-year plan was the eighth five-year plan (1993-98). And the practice was abandoned not because these plans were rarely implemented as they were dependent on disbursements from the Ministry of Finance (a persistently rising challenge each subsequent year due to the ever narrowing fiscal space – the outcome of flawed fiscal and monetary policies nearly all of which persist to this day) but because of critical issues facing the economy after the 28 May 1998 Chagai nuclear tests led to the imposition of crippling sanctions on Pakistan, including cessation of most external inflows. An annual programme was therefore rightly considered more appropriate.
In 2005 the five-year plans were renamed Medium Term Development Framework (MTDF), a policy measure programme, with inputs from Ministry of Finance, Economic Coordination Committee (also headed by the Finance Minister), and of course the Planning Commission. Budgets today include not only the Annual Programme, but also the MTDF – so much for implementing a paperless e-economy.
Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, a couple of weeks prior to her assassination in December 2007, stated while launching her party manifesto, “our policy is based on five Es – employment, education, energy, environment and equality.”
Seventeen years later, eerily with the same slogan - 5 Es - Uraan programme has been launched. Four of the five Es are the same indicative of the failure of intervening administrations to improve any of the identified targets but the one difference in Uraan was the replacement of Benazir Bhutto’s employment with exports.
Given the very high unemployment rates today, nearing 22 percent, one is bound to consider this a very unwise decision.
Uraan argues that enhancing the export sector is to drive economic growth, increase foreign exchange earnings, and boost the country’s global trade position. It ignores the other desired form of foreign exchange earnings, remittances, which are rising by the year and in the current year have slightly overtaken exports: in 2023 exports were 27.876 billion dollars with remittances at 27.3 billion dollars, in 2024 exports were 30.967 billion dollars against remittances of 30.251 billion dollars and July-January 2025 exports were 19.175 billion dollars against remittances of 20.849 billion dollars.
Critics facetiously argue that remittances may not have been included in Uraan as the drafters were unable to find a synonym for remittances that started with the letter e. What is, however baffling, is that the Uraan document fails to consider the damning indictment by the International Monetary Fund in its 10 October 2024 staff level agreement report: “the state’s support of businesses through subsidies, favourable taxation arrangements, protection and government price setting has undermined the development of dynamic and outward oriented economy.
Subsidies have taken the form of low-cost financing and other concessions, which although varied across industries, left financing and taxes net of subsidies more favourable than in peer economies and less-favoured sectors.
The tax system has been extensively used to provide non-transparent support through exemptions for privileged sectors like real estate, agriculture, manufacturing, and energy, as well as, through the proliferation of Special Economic Zones.
The government’s intervention in price setting, including for agricultural commodities, fuel products, power, and gas (biannual), combined with high tariff and non-tariff protection tilted the playing field in favour of selected groups or sectors.
Despite all this support, the business sector has failed to become an engine of growth, and the incentives eventually weakened competition and trapped resources in chronically inefficient (including perpetually “infant”) industries.“
The four Es commonalities between the Benazir Bhutto manifesto and the Uraan programme are cited below though there are some differences that are associated with technical global advances: (i) E-Pakistan (accelerating digital transformation to enhance operational efficiency, promote innovation, and improve Pakistan’s competitiveness on the global stage, (ii) environment and climate change, implementing sustainable practices to address climate change, protect natural resources, and ensure water and food security for long-term ecological balance; (iii) energy and infrastructure, Developing affordable, efficient, and green energy solutions to support industrial growth, reduce energy costs, and ensure energy security and (iv) equity and empowerment (promoting social justice by ensuring that all segments of society benefit from economic progress).
To conclude, Uraan Pakistan document does not earmark specific funds for specific activities for the next five years. This is partly because the country is under a very rigidly monitored IMF programme and the only homegrown policy, i.e., to slash current expenditure by at least 2 trillion rupees through voluntary sacrifice by the major elite recipients, with the potential to turn the economy around, has, so far received only rhetorical administration support, like its predecessors.
The recent Cabinet expansion is now cited as yet another example of the government not putting its money (taxpayers’ money) where its mouth is.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
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