Government set next year development budget at Rs. 900b, with ambitious 4.8% of GDP growth rate: Asad

Muhammad Asad

ISLAMABAD: Government has set next year development budget at Rs. 900 billion with ambitious 4.8 percent GDP growth rate during fiscal year 2021-2022.
It was shared by Federal Minister for Planning and Development Mr. Asad Umar during a news conference in Islamabad on Friday.

While shedding light on prominent features of next fiscal year budget’s estiamte, Federal Minister for Planning and Development said that government set the target of GDP growth rate of 4.8 percent which is a little ambitious but due to improving indicators of economic stability during recent months, Government is hoping to achieve this target.

Asad maintained that during current year the cotton and poultry sectors affected badly due to coronavirus pandemic, however due to normalization of situations and provision of seeds to the farmers and other facilities including use of pesticides will give better output and due to growing demand of cotton in the international market an increase in exports are expected during next fiscal year.

He further added that government incentivized package to industries including constructions sectors had led to 15 percent additional usage of electricity in industry sector which indicates an increase in its production. According to Asad Umar, government also adopted measures to increase the production of natural gas and coal which specifically increased their production in the country. Asad maintained that federation and provinces are working in coordination to achieve better results of cotton corps during next fiscal year.

While sharing next financial year budget priorities, Asad Umar observed that based on these measures, and statistics government set is aiming at 4.8 percent GDP growth target. He noted that previous government also achieved about 5 percent GDP growth rate in the past and it is an optimistic target.

Asad Umar said that due to normalization of situation of coronavirus pandemic and improvement in different sectors of national economy the government set the exports target at $ 26.8 billion dollar for next fiscal year 2021-2022 as compare to the $ 25.3 billion exports target of current fiscal year. Asad informed that the current account deficit for next fiscal year is expected to be 0.07 percent.

While commenting on Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP), Umar informed that government set PSDP funding for next fiscal year at Rs. 900 billion by adding Rs. 250 million to the current fiscal year PSDP funds of Rs. 650 billion and noted it as a big increase for initiating great ventures under public private partnership.

While providing an overview of next year development spending Federal Minister for Planning and Development said that next year spending on mega projects include Hyderabad-Sukkur Motorway, construction of dams, and development projects in selected districts of Balochistan and Sindh.

According to him, there would be more funding to health and education sectors and government is heading to allocate Rs. 28 billion to health sector, Rs. 27 billion to Higher Education Commission and Rs. 5 billion for skilled education programme during fiscal year 2021-2022.