IMF-government staff-level agreement: Averting FY20 mini-budget 'big success': PM

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday expressed his satisfaction at staff level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and stated that saving public from the mini budget in the ongoing fiscal year is a 'big success' of the government and reflection of the IMF's confidence on government's economic policies.

While reviewing overall economic situation of the country, the prime minister was informed by his economic team that there is a positive trend in overall economic indicators and further improvement is expected. The prime minister chaired two back-to-back meetings with first on overall economic situation followed by another to review subsides to provide relief to the poor and salaried class.

The meeting was attended by Minister for Planning Development and Reforms Asad Umar, Adviser on Commerce Abdul Razak Dawood, Adviser on Finance Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh, Secretary Finance, Governor State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Dr Reza Baqir, and Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Information Firdous Ashiq Awan.

The prime minister was briefed on economic indicators including the current account deficit, the foreign direct investment, the remittances, and on inflation. The prime Minister expressed satisfaction on improvement in economic indicators and stated that government's utmost effort was that the benefits of improvement were passed on to people.

He said that people are facing a difficult situation due to economic mismanagement of the previous governments, and the government wants to provide relief to the salaried class and low-income people. Earlier, the prime minister chaired a meeting to review the subsidies provided by the government to different sectors and was given a briefing on subsidies provided for energy, food and fertilizer sectors, and with regard to various programmes initiated under the Ehsaas programme including the scholarship programme.

The meeting was informed that basic purpose of the subsidy was to provide relief to the low income and the poor as well as promotion of industries and access to higher education.

The meeting was informed that Rs251 billion subsidies are being provided - Rs162 billion to power consumers consuming below 300 units monthly, Rs8.5 billion to agriculture tube wells in Balochistan, Rs18 billion to merged areas, Rs25 billion to the AJK and K-Electric, whereas Rs10 billion has been allocated to provide electricity to industries at lower price, and Rs24 billion for gas.

The government is also providing billions of rupee in subsidy to control wheat and flour prices, and these included Rs5 billion for maintaining strategic reserves, Rs8 billion for Gilgit-Baltistan arrears of subsidy on wheat, Rs2.5 billion for Ramzan Package at the Utility Stores Corporation, whereas Prime Minister Package includes Rs21 billion subsidy and Rs6 billion has been allocated for current fiscal year for providing wheat and flour.

The meeting was also informed that Rs193 billion has been allocated for various programmes under Ehsaas and the prime minister stated that the purpose of subsidy was to provide support to the vulnerable. The prime minister also expressed satisfaction on staff level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

He said that saving the public from a mini-budget in the ongoing fiscal year was a major success of the government, and a reflection of the confidence of the IMF on government's economic policies. The prime minister directed Minister for Energy to take action against power theft and directed them to go after the big thieves. The prime minister also directed taking action against cartels, profiteers and hoarders to save the people from exploitation.