The government procured $321.50 million from foreign commercial banks (around 20 percent) out of total external loans of $1.622 billion in the first two months (July-August) of 2019-20 and 50 percent more than the comparable period of last year ($820.05 million). This was revealed by the Economic Affairs Division (EAD) data released here on Monday.
The government budgeted foreign assistance of $12.957 billion for the current fiscal year including $2 billion foreign commercial loans. The country received $918.68 million from multilaterals (excluding the first trance release from the IMF) and $382.05 million bilaterally during July-August 2019-20.
According to EAD, the government borrowed $321.50 million from foreign commercial banks compared to $70 million during the same period of last year. Citibank disbursed $148.2 million in August. The country borrowed $123.31 million from Dubai Bank out of total committed amount of $325 million and $50 million from a consortium of Credit Suisse out of its total commitment of $250 million in July.
China disbursed $158.3 million in the first two months of fiscal year 2019-20 including $27.2 million for the Havelian-Thakot road project, $68.2 million for the Sukkur-Multan motorway and $5.07 million for the Orange Line Metro project.
The Islamic Development Bank disbursed $285.21 million in the first two months out of the total of $1.1 billion budgeted for the current fiscal year. Asian Development Bank (ADB) disbursed $528.77 million, United Kingdom (UK) $80.98 million, World Bank $83 million, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) $21.64 million, USA $11.9 million and Japan $15.95 million in the first two months of current fiscal year.