ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s timely finalisation of the flood recovery plan is essential to support the discussions, along with continuing financial support from multilateral and bilateral partners, says the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

IMF Resident Representative in Pakistan Esther Perez Ruiz in a message told Business Recorder that IMF staff continue discussions with the Pakistani authorities over policies to reprioritize and better target support toward humanitarian and rehabilitation needs, while also accelerating reform efforts to preserve macroeconomic and fiscal sustainability.

The timely finalization of the recovery plan is essential to support the discussions, along with continuing financial support from multilateral and bilateral partners, she added.

However, the Fund and Finance Division have yet to agree on the starting date for negotiations on the ninth review under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) programme.

Staff-level mission date not finalised: IMF wants required adjustments

Official sources revealed that some policy slippages on the part of the government have delayed the finalisation of a date for the start formal negotiations on the 9th review.

As per the IMF seventh, and eighth review documents, uploaded on the website end September 2022, the ninth review was scheduled for November 3, 2022.

The executive board approved the sixth review on February 2, 2022, following discussions that ended on November 18, 2021, with the officials of Pakistan – the time lapse attributed to the delay in meeting the “prior” conditions.

According to the staff report released after approval of sixth review, the proposed schedule for seventh review was March 4, 2022 and June 3, 2022 for eighth review.

However, the IMF executive board approved the seventh and eighth review under the EFF on August 29, following discussions that ended on May 25th 2022 – the delay was attributable to delay in meeting the ‘prior’ conditions.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022