All steps will be taken to enhance exports: Dar briefed about macroeconomic indicators

Federal Minister for Finance, Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar Friday chaired Monetary and Fiscal Policies Co-ordination Board meeting. The Minister emphasised to have a more broad based inclusive growth and better co-ordination between the monetary and fiscal policies in view of rapidly changing global economic environment. He particularly emphasised on enhancing the exports and stressed importance of the Cabinet Sub-Committee on Production and Exports in identifying steps and measures which would enhance exports.
He said that government is cognisant of the declining trend in exports and will take all possible measures to reverse the trend. The Secretary Finance briefed that macroeconomic indicators continued to show positive growth. Fiscal year 2014-15 registered at 4.24 percent growth which is the highest growth in the last seven years. This is the second year that GDP growth remained above 4 percent. A number of measures have been taken in the budget for export promotion.
During July 2015-16 current account deficit has narrowed to $159 million as compared to $820 million last year. The remittances during outgoing fiscal year 2014-15 witnessed remarkable growth of above 16 percent as compared to last year and reached $18.4 billion. The foreign direct investment remained subdued but has started improving as in July of the current fiscal year 2015-16. This will be further supplemented through CPEC investment.
The inflation has been contained in 2014-15 at 4.53 percent against 8.62 percent of last year. During July of 2015-16 the headline inflation increased by 1.8 percent as compared to 7.9 percent of last year. The foreign exchange reserve continued its upward trend and reached to above $18 billion. The SBP briefed the meeting about the money supply, net domestic and foreign assets as well as the decisions in July to keep the SBP target (Policy) rate unchanged at 6.5 percent. This decision was preceded by a reduction of 100 bps in ceiling rate to 7.0 percent in May, 2015.
The Finance Minister expressed the hope that improvement in electricity and gas supply as well as lower policy rate will bring further improvement in productivity and growth. "Going forward, we should put all our efforts to gear up the exports and address the issues hampering its growth," he said. The meeting was attended by Minister for Commerce, Deputy Governor SBP, Secretary Finance along with renowned economists Dr Ishrat Hussain Director IBA and Dr Asad Zaman Vice Chancellor PIDE and on special invitation secretaries of Ministries of Food, Security & Research and Industries attended the meeting.