ISLAMABAD : The government has fixed 5 % growth target for 2022-23.
The Annual Plan Coordination Committee (APCC) approved key targets for the next fiscal year in its meeting held here on Saturday .
The growth target of 5% seems ambitious as the donor agencies like the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) had forecasted that in the given situation when Pakistan’s economic activities may slow down further due to shortage of power and other irritants to keep its growth rate for next fiscal between 3-4 %.
However , the government seems convinced that it can overcome major irritants in the first quarter of the next fiscal like power shortage and spike in inflation and would be in a position to achieve growth target of 5 %.
The coalition government is also following a conscious approach for its public sector development programme for upcoming fiscal year .
Ahsin Iqbal ,minister for Planning and Development , briefed the .media persons on decisions made by APCC . He said Pakistan’s total volume of Public Sector Development Plan (PSDP) for next fiscal would be 2184 billion and of it federal share would be Rs 800 billion. The major share of Rs 433 billion will go to infrastructure . Public Private Partnership (PPP) programme will get a share of Rs 100 billion. Transport and Communication sector to get Rs 277 billion.
Social sector to get Rs 144 billion, Science and Technology Rs 35 billion .
Energy sector allocation stands at Rs 84 billion, water related projects will get Rs 83 billion, agriculture 13 and Industry to get 5 billion. Housing sector to get Rs 39 billion . For governance the government plans to spend Rs 16 billion. Gilgit and Azad Kashmir to get Rs 96 billion . Merged districts of Khyber Pukhtunkhaw (KPK) to get Rs 50 billion.
Minister for Planning and Development claimed in his media talk that
ML-1 project was top priority of the incumbent government. Ahsin Iqbal said prime minister, Shahbaz Sharif, has spoken on ML -1 project with Chinese president . The government has fixed growth target for key sectors for the next fiscal . The official documents suggested that agriculture growth target has been fixed at 3.9 %, real estate 3.8 % . Industry to grow at 5 %, education sector growth target has been fixed at ,4.9%, and services sector at 5.1 %.
Ahsin Iqbal declared that the government will complete development projects initiated by the previous government.
He said 90 % of PSDP will be spent on the on- going development projects . He claimed a PTI government plan to set up a university at Prime Minister House was a fake project of the previous government and it’s being scrapped . He said the government will set up
Dr Abdul Qadir Khan University in Islamabad . He recalled that Pakistan’s top nuclear scientist , Dr Abdul Qadir Khan, had written him a letter for it in his life .
