Pakistan Economy Performance-The daily times

WASHINGTON: In a meeting with Adviser on Finance Shaukat Tareen on Saturday, top International Monetary Fund (IMF) and European leaders commended Pakistan’s economic achievements made in a short span of time. Tareen, who is leading a high-level Pakistani delegation to the annual World Bank-IMF spring gathering, held productive meetings with IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss Kahn, Deputy Managing Director Murilo Portugal and the ministers from Germany, Britain, France, Turkey, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan. Kahn, Portugal and UK’s Secretary of State for International Development Douglas Alexander commended Pakistan’s achievements made through its homegrown programme of economic reforms.German Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development Wieczorek-Zeul appreciated the courageous measures taken by Pakistan to correct the macroeconomic imbalances. She reaffirmed Germany’s commitment to support the country in overcoming its economic challenges and offered a debt swap for the HIV AIDS and Malaria Global Fund. In a meeting with Turkish Minister of Economy Mehmet Simsek, the two countries agreed to increase the mutual trade volume as well as investment in the business sector. He held constructive meetings with his counterparts from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka. Tareen reiterated that Pakistan would continue its support for the development and stability of Afghanistan. He proposed to set up groups to work on different areas for strengthening bilateral relations. Tareen also suggested availing international assistance for the regional integration projects. Pakistan and Afghanistan agreed to work closely on trade related issues including tariffs and unofficial trade.The financial adviser briefed his interlocutors about the current economic challenges and the blowback effect of the war on terrorism being faced by Pakistan. Islamabad, he said, was focusing on agriculture, manufacturing, infrastructure and poverty reduction for achieving a higher growth rate and a better standard of living for the people. Tareen highlighted that mobilising domestic resources was the key challenge and efforts had to be made to increase revenues to bridge the savings-investment gap and reduce Pakistan’s reliance on external borrowing. app