Education is critical to the social and economic development and has a profound impact on population health. Education and health projects in the public sector are considered to be the biggest initiatives any government can undertake. Undoubtedly spending on these two sectors is a measure of social and economic value in a developed world. Pakistan’s present government is putting a lot of focus on these two sectors, it has promised to increase the spending on education and health sectors as well and will also improve the quality of service in both the sectors. World Bank has been asking the Government…
Author: Arooj Asghar
Women’s empowerment in Pakistan is heavily dependent on many different variables that include geographical location (urban/rural), educational status, social status, and age. Working women of Pakistan have always tried to improve the financial stability of their respective households but sadly their work is always undervalued. Empowering socially, economically, educationally, politically and legally has always been a difficult task to achieve in an underdeveloped country. Therefore, Pakistani policymakers should specifically make the policies on women’s empowerment at the national level for health, education, economic opportunities, gender-based violence, and political participation. Pakistan’s women development model is very much a work in progress…
Pakistan has a huge advantage of its geographical location yet it could not avail the full advantage of its resources. Low foreign direct investment, the high cost of doing business, poor infrastructure, and political instability have impeded the economic growth of Pakistan. In these circumstances, the establishment of special industrial zones is a must to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) and generate economic activities in the country. We have seen that worldwide special economic zones have played a vital role in the creation of jobs, enhancement of exports, and development of the economy. Various governments in the past have established…
Like other developing countries, foreign investment in Pakistan is widely considered an important vehicle for its economic growth. Pakistan provides numerous opportunities with attractive returns for multinational companies (MNCs); fully protects foreign investment under the law and has also signed double taxation treaties with various countries to give benefits to foreign investors. The legal framework for foreign investment is provided through “Foreign Private Investment (promotion and protection) Act, 1976”, and the “Protection of Economic Reform Act, 1992”. Most of the existing MNCs are satisfied with the concessions and regulations especially related to the repatriation of dividends, whereas such benefits are…
Five years back, there was severe load shedding in Pakistan and foreign investors were reluctant in investing in the infrastructure sector especially in the power sector of Pakistan. Despite having vast energy resources especially coal reserves and water yet Pakistan couldn’t utilize these indigenous resources due to lack of policy framework and lack of funds. Due to load shedding, economic activities in the country were slowed down and caused a public unrest. As per analysis, capacity utilization in some of the key industries was fallen to nearly 50 percent, worst affected sectors were fertilizer, textile and agriculture. In 2013, China’s President, Xi Jinping, proposed establishing economic…
New government immediately after assuming power started working on reviving the economy of the country. Federal Minister for Finance, Revenue, and Economic Affairs presented certain revisions in the federal budget for fiscal year 2018-19 approved in May 2018 to the parliament in the second week of September 2018. “Finance Supplementary (Amendment) Bill, 2018” or commonly called a Mini Budget is mainly aimed to; improve the tax revenues by removing certain fiscal reliefs, increase spending under public sector development program and deploy funds for the construction of affordable housings in the first phase. According to Finance Ministry, budget deficit will expand…
With around 220 million people, Pakistan is amongst the most populous countries in the world where millions of people are still living without basic necessities including proper accommodation. Pakistan’s real estate sector is traditionally unorganized and is characterized by various factors that hinder its growth such as lack of uniform laws, non-availability of bank financing, high security requirement for financing, volatile interest rates and lack of transparency in estimating transaction values. Moreover, in order to make real estate sector more attractive, it is important to bring greater transparency in registering the property with the local land departments. Pakistan’s geographic location…
In last few years, banking system in Pakistan has entered into a new phase of evolution yet facing various issues, where political instability and economic uncertainty remain the main problem. On one side, banks are making profits, defaults are on decline and have surplus liquidity in recent years but on the other side, economic conditions in the country have deteriorated in last two years due to political instability. Economic growth is an apt indicator for the growth of the banking sector; Pakistan’s economic expansion has been quite impressive from the perspective of GDP growth rate in last five years and…
Pakistan is currently facing a foreign exchange crisis where boosting exports on a sustainable basis should remain the prime focus of the new government. New government has inherited not so strong economy, high budget deficit, high debt profile and frustration among young voters looking for a change. The checklist is long, but there are four critical areas to immediately focus on including fiscal belt-tightening, improving the business climate, first controlling and later improving deteriorating current account deficit and curbing corruption. Pakistan has so far failed to get foreign investment from US, Europe and Middle East while most of its infrastructure…