Shaukat Tarin Presents Economic Survey 2021

The Economic Survey for 2020-21 has highlighted the salient features of economic performance in the outgoing fiscal year.

ISLAMABAD: (UrduPoint/UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News-June 10^th, 2021) Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin has presented the Economic Survey for 2020-21 today.

The Economic Survey for 2020-21 has highlighted the salient features of economic performance in the outgoing fiscal year. According to the reports, the Survey shed light on the total debt and liabilities that touched the highest figure of Rs 45 trillion by the end of March 2021 as compared to the last year figures of Rs 44.6 trillion.

The growth rate was 2 per cent in nine month—the lowest ever growth of TDL in a single year in 15 years and total debt of the government grew by 1.5 per cent during this period.

The total debt, however, decreased by almost 8 per cent in one year. According to the reports, the multilateral and bilateral sources besides the external resources played important role in this regard.

Total debt and liabilities remained at 95.3 per cent of the GDP at the end of third quarter of 2020-21 as compared to last year GDP of 103 per cent.

The debt to DGP ratio improved mainly because of increase in nominal growth as inflation remained on higher side, so the nominal size of growth also jacked up. Besides it, the exchange rate appreciated, so it also helped the government to show improvement in debt to GDP ratio.

The unfortunate aspect is that the government did not use population census figures of 2017 approved by the Council of Common Interests, provisional GDP growth rate of 3.94 per cent and per capita income at $1, 543 in outgoing fiscal year. According to the officials, the population census required spadework from the National Institute of Policy Studies (NIPS). When this will be done, then whole series of per capita income will be adjusted accordingly.